Boyce Allen Hudson, a former state Department of Environment and Natural Resources official, is scheduled to plead guilty in federal court Tuesday to trying to expedite a permit for a company in exchange for $196,000, according to court documents.

Hudson is accused of trying to help a company get permits to build an ethanol production plant, according to federal court documents. Hudson is scheduled to plead guilty in Judge Terrence W. Boyle's courtroom.

Richard Rogers, an assistant secretary at the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources, was hired Monday as the new executive director of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund.

Rogers succeeds Bill Holman, who left in December to be a visiting scholar at Duke University. Rogers will start Aug. 1 and receive a salary of $125,000 a year, Wade Rawlins reports.

The trust fund, an independent state agency, awards $100 million a year in grants to help finance projects statewide that enhance or restore degraded waters and protect unpolluted waters.

Rogers has worked at the department for 13 years in various roles from legislative analyst to lobbyist to director of conservation and community affairs.

"Richard has demonstrated leadership in protection of North Carolina's natural resources through his work with the land trust community, local governments and of course state agencies," said Phil Baddour, chairman of the trust fund.