Commissioner White marches through missteps

From the early 1980s when he patrolled Tampa streets as a police officer to his rise in local politics this decade, Kevin White has been a hard-charger who sometimes cut corners and blurred ethical boundaries.

The first-term county commissioner has weathered elections law violations and personal bankruptcy.

Despite the bumps, White has won three elections, two handily, and raised campaign cash prolifically. The 44-year-old commissioner has escaped serious consequences for his actions despite a stream of negative headlines since first taking office as a Tampa city councilman in 2003.

Taxpayers will pay for one of White's predicaments: In June, Hillsborough County commissioners approved spending more than $100,000 in legal fees to fight a sexual-harassment lawsuit filed by White's former aide, Alyssa Ogden.

Monday, the civil lawsuit goes to trial before U.S. District Judge Richard Lazzara. Jurors will decide whether White fired his aide, then 23, because she resisted his sexual advances. Ogden has accused White of unsolicited grabbing, touching and inappropriate remarks.

Ogden said the improper advances started in April 2007, soon after she took the job. White invited her on a trip to Atlanta. During their stay, Ogden says White showed up at her hotel room and asked to sleep with her.

White denies the allegations and says he fired Ogden for poor performance. He later said in depositions that he arranged for Ogden to make the trip to facilitate a romantic liaison with C. Blythe Andrews Jr., a man in his 70s who is chairman of the Florida Sentinel Bulletin, a twice-weekly newspaper.

Andrews has denied any romantic intentions with Ogden.

White declined to be interviewed for this article. But public records and personnel files paint a picture of him bouncing from problem to problem. He was reprimanded more than once as an officer and filed for bankruptcy twice.

White has been formally charged with an ethical lapse once. Last year he had to pay a $9,500 fine in a deal with the Florida Elections Commission for using campaign donations to buy tailor-made suits and ties.

Neighborhood activists generally praise White as attentive to their concerns. Still, the volume of accusations and negative publicity has clouded his political career.

"Let's just say he's got a lot of explaining to do," said Randy Baron, former president of the Old Seminole Heights Neighborhood Association, an area White has represented as both councilman and commissioner.

Tampa roots

Kevin Lucian White was born Nov. 26, 1964, in Hornell, N.Y. He grew up in Tampa and graduated from King High in 1982.

White served one to two months in the Navy, according to his application for employment with the Tampa Police Department. His service records show he was discharged while at recruit training in San Diego. The status of his discharge is not available under the Freedom of Information Act. The Web site for White's Icon Security Solutions company touts his service as a "U.S. Navy veteran."

After the Navy, White attended Hillsborough Community College for two years, but his police job application does not indicate that he earned an associate's degree. In December 1986, White married Jennie Navarro. They have two children and live in Seminole Heights.

White worked several jobs after HCC, including nearly four years as finance director at a car dealership before applying to the police department in 1990.

His record during four years with Tampa police is mixed. He was generally given good ratings for attitude, appearance, safety consciousness and initiative.

"OFC. White displays good street sense and responds to illegal activity or suspected illegal activity with haste," a sergeant wrote in one of White's evaluations.

But he was reprimanded at times for being overly zealous. He was reprimanded twice for going outside his assigned area to make arrests.

"At times the effectiveness of the work was lacking because of OFC. White's lack of willingness to listen to others to accomplish a given task," the sergeant said in White's evaluation.

His superiors reprimanded White in writing three times for improper vehicle chases, one of which injured a civilian. His actions in that case cost the city $85,000 in a lawsuit settlement.

Three months before he resigned in April 1994, the department found White misused his authority by threatening to have a man arrested if he didn't pay him $500 to cover an insurance deductible. The two men had been involved in a car crash while White was off duty.

"The man was at fault in the accident and told me he didn't have insurance, but would give me $500 if I came to pick it up," White told The Tampa Tribune in March 2003. "Unfortunately, I was in uniform and driving a police car."

White resigned before any disciplinary measures were taken. He said he left the department for a better-paying job as finance director with St. Pete Jeep-Chrysler.

Personal finances

On the Web site of White's security company, he boasts of managing multimillion-dollar budgets during his career as sales manager and finance director for automotive franchises. Yet White has had difficulty managing his personal finances.

In December 1989, the Whites filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy relief, which discharges the applicant's debts. The bankruptcy filing shows $44,000 in unsecured debts, including $31,800 in credit card charges.

The Whites were discharged from the bankruptcy in April 1990. A year later, however, they filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy, which allows a debtor to keep property and pay debts over time. The Whites were discharged from the bankruptcy in August 1994, but not before losing a home they owned on Arch Street to foreclosure.

White earned a bachelor's degree in criminal justice in 1992 from Tampa College, a now-defunct business school, and a bachelor's in business management from National-Louis University in Tampa in 1993, according to the county Web site. Two years ago, he added a master's degree in organizational management from the University of Phoenix in Tampa.

Political career

In 2001, White filed to run for Tampa City Council District 5. He proved an able fundraiser, raising $60,000 before the March 2003 election. He came out on top in the four-person race and faced his aunt, Bernadine White-King, in a runoff.

Three months after taking office, White unsuccessfully pushed to give city council members a 23 percent pay raise, from $28,974 to $35,600. He quit his job at St. Pete Jeep-Chrysler a month after making the proposal. He later took a job as security director for Rooms To Go in Tampa.

White made few headlines during his three years on the council, but he was appreciated by some East Tampa neighborhood leaders.

"We were trying to get prostitutes off several corners and get a house shut down where there were drugs," said Gladys Jackson of the Rainbow Heights neighborhood. White "went to the police. He helped us get that shut down," she said.

"I would not say anything negative about Kevin White because every time I've gone to him for help he's been very cooperative," said Wally Sheppard, a board member with the Palm River Point Community Development Corp.

Other community leaders were not as effusive. Fran Costantino, who has fought to keep rock-crushing companies and crematoriums out of Ybor City, said White never offered help while representing her neighborhood on the council. She said she asked him to come to one neighborhood event.

"He said he was busy," Costantino said. "That's all I need to ask anybody."

White decided to leave the council early to run for the District 3 seat held by county Commissioner Tom Scott, who couldn't run again because of term limits.

The Democratic primary battle between White and East Tampa civic activist Chloe Coney was contentious. White ran an ad in the Florida Sentinel Bulletin saying one of Coney's projects, an open-air market near Lake Avenue and 29th Street, had become a "den for drug dealers."

A police spokesman told The Tampa Tribune at the time that the market had once been a center of drug activity but had been cleaned up for nearly three years before White's ad.

During the campaign, White lodged a complaint with the county administrator alleging that his aunt, White-King, had campaigned for Coney while she was supposed to be working at her county job. An investigation by the county's Professional Responsibility Section ruled the allegations unfounded.

"It was very stressful and embarrassing that my professional integrity was questioned and that my colleagues and friends were asked to corroborate the false accusations made against me," White-King said several years later.

White beat Coney by 642 votes, then easily defeated his Republican opponent in the general election.

Money and violations

White raised $236,779 in campaign contributions. Developers and building-related businesses contributed $63,500 to White in the 2006 election cycle; lawyers gave $23,635.

Lawyer David Mechanik said he contributed $2,000 to White's first commission campaign because he thought White had been a good city councilman and would make a good county commissioner.

A host of taxicab, limousine and ambulance companies contributed $5,535 to the campaign. White is chairman of the county Public Transportation Commission, which regulates those businesses.

White used some campaign cash for clothing. In a July 2005 campaign report, he said he wrote checks to a consultant, who turned out to be a clothier. Facing up to $38,000 in fines for elections violations, White agreed to pay the Florida Elections Commission $9,500.

His fellow commissioners have not publicly discussed White's recent troubles.

"No I haven't asked him about it. I won't ask him about it," said Commissioner Jim Norman. "If it doesn't affect the board votes and how he runs his campaign, it's none of my business."