White got mortgage from connection made as commissioner

During three years he served on the Tampa City Council and four years on the Hillsborough County Commission, Kevin White always made sure he secured a seat on a board that regulates taxicabs, limousines and other public transportation.

After he left office, White used a connection he made as chairman of that board -- the Public Transportation Commission -- to obtain a $91,300 mortgage despite being deeply in debt.

The mortgage was from Moses Investment Holdings LLC, whose owner, Michael J. Moses, also owns cab, limousine and van companies. When he bought the companies, Moses had to get approval from the county PTC. White was chairman at the time.

Records also show Moses' partner in the transit companies is Nancy Castellano, a longtime taxicab executive, who has given money to White's political campaigns.

Moses and Castellano did not return phone calls. White declined to comment but his attorney, Michael Laurato, said Moses should be commended, not stigmatized, for the loan.

"Everybody knows Mr. White is going through tough economic times," Laurato said. "I think it's admirable that someone was able to get him into something affordable and give him a second chance."

The 2,238-square-foot house White and his wife Jennie purchased in Riverview cost $143,300. Moses issued White a mortgage for $91,100 with an option to borrow up to $182,000. The mortgage is to be paid by Dec. 29, 2015. It is unclear where White got the rest of the money for the house.

The mortgage issued to White on the Riverview home is the only one Moses has written, according to records at the Clerk of Circuit Court. Before he got in the transit business, Moses was a principal partner in health care and rehabilitation businesses.

It's unlikely White could have gotten a conventional loan from a bank or mortgage company for the Riverview house.

He and his wife owe $300,000 on a home in Seminole Heights where they were living until late last year. An investment property they own in Tampa was foreclosed on in February. Records show an outstanding principal on that house of $139,232.

White also owes tens of thousands of dollars to his private attorneys for defending him in a 2009 sexual harassment lawsuit. Hillsborough County is suing White to recoup legal fees expended as a co-defendant in that lawsuit.

Mario Tamargo, chief inspector at the PTC, said White never asked the agency's staff for preferential treatment when Moses was obtaining permits for his van, cab and limo businesses. The PTC staff checks out permit applicants to make sure they don't have criminal records and are financially stable. The applications are then forwarded to the seven-member PTC.

"I never heard anything from Kevin that this is a good one or not," Tamargo said. "Everything was above board on that."

The question of whether White did anything improper rests on whether he voted in way favorable to Moses in with the promise of future financial help, said Tampa attorney Tom Scarritt, a former member of the state Commission on Ethics.

"If a member of the Hillsborough PTC board agreed to provide preferential treatment to a party coming before his board in exchange for some future economic benefit, that would constitute an ethical breach," Scarritt said. "We don't know that -- yet."

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