Gov. Brian Schweitzer on Friday appointed Rep. Dan Villa, D-Anaconda, as his education policy adviser to replace Jan Lombardi, who was promoted to executive director of the community services office.

Villa has resigned from his seat in the Montana House where he had served since 2005. He chaired the Joint Appropriations Subcommittee on Education this year.

Lombardi succeeds Linda Carlson, who resigned.

The changes took effect immediately. Lombardi's salary will be $72,382 a year, while Villa's will be $55,000.

Schweitzer said he was pleased Lombardi would take on the new challenge to lead efforts to promote community services in schools, campuses and Montana communities.

"Jan has extraordinary organizational skills," he said. "This office is about organizing volunteers statewide. Given the level of interest (President Barack) Obama has in volunteerism, it's important to ramp this office up with someone who has the enthusiasm and experience to take it to the next level."

Lombardi had been Schweitzer's educational policy adviser since 2005 and previously worked on the appointed staff at the Office of Public Instruction. She has a bachelor's degree from Newcomb College of Tulane University.

She has nearly 30 years of experience in government, nonprofits and the business sector, where she worked in banking and finance for large regional banks in Maryland and as a financial research consultant. Lombardi worked in the nonprofit sector on public health policy, community development, women, children and education.

Meanwhile, Villa's experience as director of the Anaconda Environmental Education Institute, an Anaconda School Board trustee and a state legislator "means he'll hit the ground running on an issue so important to Montana's future," Schweitzer said.

Villa, 26, has attended Carroll College and Montana Tech, from which he is scheduled to graduate in December. He has also served on the Deer Lodge County Planning Board and the Anaconda Local Development Corp. board of directors.

Schweitzer said Villa is what used to be called a nontraditional student, but they now are the traditional students. From this experience, Schweitzer said Villa understands moving seamlessly between the workplace and education.

"They go to different schools," the Democratic governor said. "They transfer credits. They go into the workplace. They re-enter school."

Schweitzer said fewer than 50 people in the state understand the streams of money in the "complicated maze" of K-12 school funding.

"Dan Villa understands it," Schweitzer said. "There may be two or three other members of the Legislature that understand it."

Carlson could not be reached for comment.

"She resigned," Schweitzer said. "She'd been there a few years and decided to move on."

Villa is the fourth state legislator to land a job in the Schweitzer administration.

In past years, Sen. Mike Cooney, D-Helena, was hired as a division administrator in the Labor and Industry Department, and Rep. Eve Franklin, D-Great Falls, was hired as state mental health ombudsman and is now Schweitzer's policy adviser on families.

The most controversial appointment was when the Schweitzer administration hired Sen. Sam Kitzenberg, then a Republican from Glasgow, as a Revenue Department employee in northeastern Montana in the summer of 2006. After the November 2006 election, when the Senate was tied with 25 Democrats and 25 Republicans, Kitzenberg switched parties to give Democrats 26-24 majority.

Franklin and Villa resigned from their legislative posts when appointed to state jobs, while Cooney and Kitzenberg kept theirs.