SEC probing Florida agencies' bond issues, campaign gifts.

ATLANTA The Securities and Exchange Commission has begun a comprehensive inquiry into bond issues sold by two authorities in the Orlando. Fla. area, as well as campaign contributions to public officials serving on the authorities' boards.

At the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority. the SEC recently subpoenaed testimony from four officials. Robert Hattaway, the authority's chairman. said yesterday. In separate requests. the SEC has asked for documents for three bond issues sold by the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority, according to the authority's finance director Gregory Dailer.

In addition. the SEC has asked for the campaign finance records of at least five officials in the area, including Orange County chairman Linda Chapin and Orlando Mayor Glenda Hood. according to county elections officials. Chapin, a member of the Expressway Authority's board, served on the board of the Aviation Authority until late last year. Hood serves on the Aviation Authority.

SEC officials could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Hattaway said that he has been ordered to appear before the SEC in Washington, D.C., on Thursday to discuss what the SEC had described in a June letter "as certain municipal bond offerings."

Hattaway said he would be accompanied by the authority's finance director. Maureen Riley, who was also subpoenaed. In addition. Hattaway said. the SEC has subpoenaed Bill Miller. the authority's vice chairman. and Jeff Fuqua, its former chairman. He said he did not know when Miller and Fuqua would testify, but believed that it was within the next several weeks.

Miller and Fuqua did not return phone calls seeking comment.

"I have no earthly idea what they ]the SEC is] looking for," Hattaway said. But Hattaway noted that he had "disagreed strongly" in April 1993 when the Aviation Authority's board voted, over his objection, to choose Goldman, Sachs & Co. as lead manager for upcoming transactions.

"It was my feeling that we didn't need a senior bookrunning manager at the time m because there wasn't a deal specified at the time -- and that unnecessary pressure was exerted in making that selection," he said. In June, the Aviation Authority issued $95. I million of refunding bonds with Goldman as lead manager.

Among those who voted for Goldman's selection were Orange County chairman Chapin and Orlando Mayor Hood, both Airport Authority board members at the time. Both Chapin's 1990 and Hood's 1992 campaigns had been supported by Rick T. Fitzgerald, manager of Goldman's public finance oftice in Orlando, according to Chapin.

Just days before the authority's meeting, Fitzgerald had left PaineWebber Inc. to join Goldman. Fitzgerald did not return phone calls seeking comment yesterday.

Dailer, the expressway authority's finance director, said it received an SEC subpoena on May 17 requesting information on three issues totaling $1.15 billion.

The deals were: a $385 million offering for revenue bonds sold in December 1990 for the southern connector project: $564.4 million of revenue refunding bonds issued in June 1993: and $202.7 million of refunding debt sold in November 1993.

PaineWebber was lead manager on each of the deals. Officials at the firm reached yesterday declined comment.

Dailer said that Brent Kamien from the SECs division of enforcement visited the authority on May 24 and reviewed and photocopied documents. He said the authority subsequently sent the commission copies of additional docunments.

In late June and early July. the SEC's Kamien asked the Orange County supervisor of elections to provide campaign finance records of four county commissioners, according to the supervisor's director of information Magaret Brackney. Brackney said the four were Chapin, Bill Donegan, Mary Johnson, and Fran Pignone. Mary Johnson replaced Chapin on the Aviation Authority board late last year.

Chapin said yesterday that the SEC also requested "all information in her possession," pertaining to expressway and airport authority bond deals. But she had "no idea" why the SEC requested the records, and denied that there was any connection between support from Fitzgerald during her 1990 campaign and the award to his firm of bond issues.

"Sometimes I have voted for his deals, and sometimes I didn't," she said. "My votes on all financings have always been based on information from the selection committee involved, and what I thought was in the best interests of the county."

Johnson, Donegan, and Pignone were not available for comment yesterday.

Wayne Weinberg, Mayor Hood's spokesman, said that on July 8 the SECs Kamien requested Hood's campaign records from Jan. 1, 1988, forward. Weinberg said the records were sent out, adding that Hood did not know the purpose of the SEC requests.

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