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Deal Helps Without Walls Avoid Foreclosure

By BAIRD HELGESON

bhelgeson@tampatrib.com

Published: March 4, 2009

Updated: 03/04/2009 07:00 pm

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TAMPA - Without Walls International Church has signed a modified loan agreement with its lender and no longer faces foreclosure proceedings.

"Foreclosure isn't happening," said Jac La Tour, a spokesman for the California-based Evangelical Christian Credit Union.

The new loan agreement was finalized Wednesday, he said.

The church defaulted on a $1 million loan due in August, prompting the credit union to begin foreclosure proceedings in November.

The foreclosure proceedings included another $24.5 million in loans for the Tampa ministry headquartered at 2511 N. Grady Ave. and its Lakeland branch.

La Tour wouldn't discuss the terms of the new loan agreement. Church founder Randy White declined comment.

The church and the credit union had tried for months to negotiate a new loan agreement, but White declined to sign it. White has said he disagreed with a stipulation that would have required him to give up intellectual property rights to the ministry, including revenue from future books.

From the pulpit and in statements, White has blamed critics and the lender for trying to bring down the church.

White said the church had never missed a payment in nearly eight years. The credit union was desperate to seize the potentially lucrative properties because the bank itself was at risk for going under, he said.

The credit union, which manages $3.4 billion in assets, is among the most financially sound lenders in the nation, La Tour said.

White has tried for about a year to sell the Tampa property, housed in a former Canada Dry headquarters, and the church's ministry in Lakeland, the former 10,000-seat Carpenters Home Church.

The ministry remains under the microscope of U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa. Grassley launched an inquiry to see whether White and his former wife, Paula, abused the ministry's tax-exempt status to bankroll their lavish lifestyle.

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