Over a 45-day period, Mayor John Peyton’s chief of staff made $42,500 working for the Republican Party of Florida, according to expenditure reports.

Adam Hollingsworth, whose city salary is $162,175 a year, took an unpaid leave of absence to work for the party after August’s primary. His chief responsibility was to act as liaison between Republican Gov.-elect Rick Scott and party leadership.

Those payments are from the reporting period from Aug. 20 to Oct. 28. The next round of expenditure reports are due Jan. 10.

The position was created to mend fences between Scott and party leaders who had supported his primary opponent, Bill McCollum.

Hollingsworth was recruited for the job by Susie Wiles, a Jacksonville political consultant who ran Scott’s campaign. He did not return requests seeking comment.

All indications are that Hollingsworth ably filled the position. “He is really helping out at the regional level and the local level about who Jennifer Carroll and Rick Scott are,” Carroll said in an October interview.

Scott has also put Hollingsworth on his transition team. He will be vetting state agencies.

“The governor-elect’s policies will set Florida on a path for long term job creation. … We want to see how state agencies can be better aligned to accomplish those things,” Hollingsworth said in an interview last month.

He expects his work with the transition team to finish by the end of the year.

matt.dixon@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4174

http://jacksonville.com/news/florida/2010-12-01/story/florida-gop-p...