A state Division of Culture and History executive who was the focal point of an ongoing feud with Education and the Arts Secretary Kay Goodwin over how to spend $3.75 million of lottery revenue was fired Wednesday.

Richard Ressmeyer, the division's arts director, said new state Culture and History Commissioner Randall Reid-Smith gave him a letter of termination without cause when he reported for work Wednesday morning.

"I'm an at-will employee, so I can be dismissed without cause," Ressmeyer said. "The new commissioner didn't want my services."

For months, Ressmeyer has been out front in a feud between Goodwin and the state Commission on the Arts over $7.5 million in video lottery profits in a commission fund for capital improvements to cultural facilities around the state.

Under a 1999 law, 0.5 percent of the state's video slots profits were directed into the cultural facilities fund.

In 2004, lawmakers directed that half of that revenue go to the state for repairs and improvements to the Cultural Center and other state-owned cultural and historical facilities. That law also capped the total annual appropriation to both funds at $1.5 million a year - barely half of the peak year's allocation.

At issue is whether the $7.5 million accumulated in the commission's fund prior to 2004 should also be divided 50-50, as Goodwin asserts.

Ressmeyer said the commission always has kept much of the funds in reserve, anticipating that lottery profits might not be a continuing source of revenue.

"The practice of the commission has been to use previous year's funds for current year's grants," he said.

Ressmeyer said he doesn't know if his objections to splitting the fund led to his firing.

"That's an inference that members of the commission have made," he said, adding, "I was told there was no cause, and I don't know how to interpret it."

Ginny Painter, deputy commissioner of Culture and History, said she could not comment on Ressmeyer's dismissal.

"We're not going to discuss personnel matters. It's an agency policy," she said.

Painter confirmed that there has been no action on a compromise proposal made by the commission in mid-June that would direct about $2.2 million from the commission's reserve fund for improvements to state facilities.

If an agreement is not worked out, the commission will have only about half the funds it needs to pay the $3.1 million in matching grants it has approved for the budget year that started July 1.

Since 1999, the commission has awarded a total of $10.5 million in grants for construction and renovation of cultural and arts facilities, for purchase of properties and durable equipment, including stages, lighting and sound systems.