понедельник, 12 марта 2012 г.

'I'm always in the newspaper over something over nothing' Trucking firm owner Tadin says he's done working for city

Like many a Bridgeport guy, Michael A. Tadin started out peddlinghot dogs at Sox Park and driving a truck.

Three decades later, the 52-year-old trucking king lives in a GoldCoast mansion down the street from the cardinal.

Tadin has grown rich, in part, by leasing trucks, equipment andland to Chicago taxpayers for 25 years. But the deals that broughthim wealth have also, at times, tainted him with scandal and broughthim attention he hates.

For years, Tadin managed to stay out of the newspapers, quietlyoperating Marina Cartage and a dozen other companies. All thatchanged seven years ago, when he began making headlines in scandalafter scandal.

A $1.25 million loan to an alderman. The licenses-for-bribesscheme. The Hired Truck Program scandal that erupted this year aftera Chicago Sun-Times expose.

Tadin says the FBI has investigated him. But he has never beencharged.

For years, Tadin typically would talk with reporters only if itwas off the record. But now he has decided to speak out.

"You win. I quit," Tadin bellowed in his gravelly voice, in one ofa series of lengthy interviews with the Sun-Times.

Tadin said he's through working for City Hall come June. That'swhen Mayor Daley plans to overhaul the Hired Truck Program, throughwhich, the Sun-Times has reported, the city often paid companies forlittle or no work.

"What would be the benefit of me staying working for the city?"Tadin asked. "So I can get more publicity? And take a chance oflosing my good customers? My Fortune 500 customers? Because I'malways in the newspaper over something over nothing."

Tadin insisted his trucks always did the job the city hired themto do. If the city hired trucks it didn't need, Tadin said, don'tblame the companies.

Under Daley, Tadin was the Hired Truck king, making more moneythan any other company in the program. When a 1997 scandal promptedthe mayor to spread the truck business around to more companies,Tadin still came out on top.

Tadin said his city work has steadily fallen, though, since 1997:His trucks and heavy equipment bring in $40 million a year, but only$5 million of that from city jobs.

Tadin said all he's ever done is work hard and offer services thatcompetitors couldn't or wouldn't, a lesson he wants to teach his twochildren.

"You ever write anything good about anything that anybody did?" heasked reporters. "Ever write about, in 2000, when it was snowing out,and the city was in trouble, that we sent 55 trucks into the Loop, toclean it out?"

Tadin and his friends say he is driven, a hard worker molded byhis Croatian father, who is a retired truck driver, and his Italianmother, who waited tables at Schaller's Pump, a Bridgeport landmark,until she had a stroke.

For three generations, Tadin's family has lived in Bridgeport,Chicago's most political neighborhood, an enclave that has producedmore mayors than any other.

When Tadin grew up, everyone knew everyone. It's pretty much thesame today.

As an adult, Tadin lived down the street from Richard Daley whileDaley was Cook County state's attorney.

Tadin and Daley both have moved out of the neighborhood, but theyremain loyal to Bridgeport's institutions, like the Louis L.Valentine Boys & Girls Club. Tadin and Daley are board members.

Tadin also is on the board of De La Salle Institute, the highschool he and Daley attended.

Tadin said few of his friends are politicians. But the connectionshe has are good ones:

*When Tadin needed a divorce lawyer, he hired Michael Daley, themayor's brother.

*When he needs business insurance, he calls another Daley brother,Cook County Commissioner John Daley.

*As a boy, Tadin said, he was too poor to get into games atComiskey Park. Now, he's partners with former Ald. Pat Huels in acompany, SDI Security Inc., which guards Sox park, among other majorbusinesses. SDI's board members have included Ald. Ed Burke (14th).

*Tadin's contacts reach deep into government. His sister, brotherand other relatives have city jobs. He has friends in other agencies.It helps him know when reporters call the county treasurer for copiesof his property tax bills.

"I know a lot where you go?" Tadin fumed. "Absolutely, I know alot. That's how I stay in business."

Tadin is imposing at 5 feet 11 and 260 pounds. He can go fromcharm to outrage in a moment.

Tadin's not interested in revealing too many details about hislife. Who are his best friends? He won't say. Ask about his movingout of Bridgeport and into a $4.5 million mansion, and he seethes:"What I own -- is that a crime, or something?"

He also pays property taxes on two condominiums on the Gold Coastand a $2.1 million house in Jupiter, Fla., with a boat dock. He alsoowns other property.

"Maybe you should print that I pay $500,000 a year in propertytax," Tadin said.

From interviews with those who know him and a review of publicdocuments, a profile emerges of a canny businessman, with politicalclout, who has prospered under every mayor since Jane Byrne. In acity where contractors fall out of favor each time a new mayor takesover, Tadin has always been on top. Since 1995, he has donated atleast $160,000 to politicians, including Daley.

"I got an argument with the press because you guys keep portrayingme as this big, bad guy, that I got successful because of politics,"Tadin said. "And that's a lie."

Tadin's Marina Cartage wasn't always successful, and it wasn'talways called Marina. It started out in the 1950s as BertucciTrucking. It was run by his mother's brother, Anthony Bertucci. Theychanged the name in the 1960s to Marina, after Marina City andbecause they hauled marine freight.

Tadin started working there in the early 1970s, after graduatingfrom De La Salle Institute and attending what's now called HaroldWashington College for one year.

Tadin's uncle died in 1977, and Tadin bought Marina two yearslater -- the year Byrne was elected mayor. The company had just 20trucks then and a little warehouse. Today, Tadin said, he has morethan 300 trucks, but it's still a family business, employing his twobrothers, a sister-in-law and an aunt.

Being from Bridgeport offered no advantage to Tadin with Byrne orher successor, Mayor Harold Washington.

Both were elected as reformers, promising to take power from theDaley Machine.

"Growing up in Bridgeport, Jane Byrne and Harold Washingtonweren't two popular people in Bridgeport," Tadin said. "And theycertainly weren't willing to help people. You were never gonna get noextra help coming from where I grew up at with them, with thempeople."

Still, he made inroads, leasing trucks to the city. Tadinattributed his early success to hard work and the round-the-clockservice his firm provided to the city.

Byrne reached out to Bridgeport, too, to form her own alliances.

And Tadin had friends. He'd grown up with Anthony Fratto, who wasByrne's comptroller. And Tadin became friends with Fratto's pal, AlBoumenot, Byrne's budget director. Tadin is still close with bothmen. Boumenot is an investor in one of Tadin's real estate ventures.

In 1983, Washington replaced Byrne, ousting her cronies from CityHall. But Tadin said his business flourished under Washington.

He said he got a message early on from a Washington administrationofficial: "I wouldn't live on your street in Bridgeport, and youwouldn't live in Hyde Park. But, if you do the job, you'll haveopportunity."

"And what more could you ask for?" Tadin said.

In fact, Tadin said his company did more business under Washingtonthan under Daley. But business hasn't been bad since Daley becamemayor in 1989.

Tadin has taken in tens of millions of dollars by renting trucksand heavy equipment to the city, as well as land, whether it's for anauto pound, a spot to store road salt or offices for the sewerdepartment. In the property deals, Tadin teamed with another truckingczar, Fred Barbara, a nephew of the late Ald. Fred Roti. Roti hasbeen identified as a made member of the mob. Tadin said he no longerleases land to the city.

Tadin often found a spot to make money. Take his role in two ofDaley's programs. Tadin was a subcontractor to Waste Management onthe blue-bag recycling program and still works for the company today,even though it no longer has the city recycling deal.

And Tadin was a key player in a program to strip asphalt from citystreets, heat it and put it back down, a cheaper way to pave.

It was under Daley that scandal first tainted Tadin. In 1997, theSun-Times reported that Tadin loaned $1.25 million to a security firmco-owned by Huels after the then-11th Ward alderman helped Tadin geta $1.1 million city subsidy to build his $4.5 million headquarters inthe ward. Huels resigned and went bankrupt. But Tadin said the loanwas repaid.

Today, Tadin is a partner in Huels' security firm, SDI SecurityInc. They remain friends, Tadin said.

It was the first of several scandals involving Tadin.

An alderman later claimed Tadin was double-billing the city fortrucks, but it was never proved.

Three years later, Tadin was back in the headlines, during afederal trial that, at first glance, had nothing to do with him. Itwas a case involving the licenses-for-bribes scandal under GeorgeRyan when Ryan was secretary of state. A key witness in theinvestigation testified at the trial of a driving school instructorthat she sold political fund-raising tickets for Ryan to a number ofunnamed trucking firm owners whose employees needed truckinglicenses. The witness, Mary Ann Mastrodomenico, during a blisteringcross-examination by defense attorney Thomas Durkin, didn't nameTadin. But he was one of the owners she was talking about.

In an interview with federal investigators, Mastrodomenico saidher husband helped sell tickets to Tadin in the late 1990s, sourcessaid. Tadin eventually gave her six checks for $500, according toMastrodomenico's account. Tadin was never charged with wrongdoing.

Over the years, some Tadin employees, including his brother Tom,have come under fire for working for Tadin and the city of Chicago atthe same time.

"I don't think anybody's records have been subpoenaed and beenmore reviewed than this guy's has been," said Tadin's attorney,Thomas Breen, who noted nothing has come of it. "His success has beenslow and through multiple mayoral administrations."

Tadin was back in the headlines this year, when the Sun-Timesreported waste and corruption in the Hired Truck Program, which coststaxpayers $40 million a year. The city acknowledged hiring trucks itended up not using. Tadin's businesses have not been accused ofwrongdoing.

Still, Tadin's two businesses were sidelined from the Hired TruckProgram earlier this month over a tax dispute with the city.

Tadin moaned that he's been unfairly tarred by the Hired Truckscandal. He said the Sun-Times stories "hurt a lot of innocentpeople" by linking them to organized crime.

Tadin criticized linking some owners to the mob while not exposingthose with ties to street gangs.

"You don't write nothing about connections with the Latin Kingsand the El Rukns," Tadin said.

But, when asked to connect those dots, Tadin, still a Bridgeportguy at heart, would not.

"My mother didn't raise no punk," he said.

Daleys among trucking magnate's inner circle

Michael Tadin has a very powerful circle of friends. Here are afew:

Mayor Daley

Once neighbors while Daley was Cook County state's attorney, Tadinand the mayor have long been labeled childhood friends. Which drivesTadin crazy because, as he points out, Daley is 10 years older.Still, Tadin has given thousands of dollars to Daley's campaign fundover the years, even as he prospered by leasing trucks, heavymachinery and land to the city. Both also serve on the board of theLouis L. Valentine Boys & Girls Club, a Bridgeport institution.

John Daley

The mayor's brother is an insurance broker for Tadin, arelationship that goes back many years. John Daley won't talk aboutit, though. John Daley, a Cook County Board member who also runs the11th Ward Regular Democratic Organization, has also gotten campaigndonations from Tadin. John Daley also serves on the board of theBridgeport boys club.

Michael Daley

Another brother of the mayor, Michael Daley is the name partner inthe Daley & George law firm. He was Tadin's divorce lawyer. MichaelDaley also defended Tadin in a lawsuit last year over a polluted plotof land he sold for $2 million to the United NeighborhoodOrganization, a Hispanic group. UNO backed out after deciding theland -- tainted with arsenic and other toxins, according to an UNOlawsuit -- wasn't fit for a planned school.

Anthony Fratto

A boyhood friend of Tadin, Fratto was city comptroller under MayorJane Byrne, who usually shunned people from Bridgeport, the Daleyfamily's turf. Fratto was an exception. So was Tadin. Fratto now is asenior vice president at George K. Baum & Co., a public finance housethat sold bonds for the renovation of Soldier Field, as well as forMillennium Park.

Albert Boumenot

A close friend of Fratto, Boumenot was Byrne's budget director.He's now a partner in one of Tadin's businesses. Boumenot's nameoften is stamped on Tadin's government contracts as a notary public.Boumenot also works for George K. Baum & Co.

Patrick Harbour

A longtime friend of the Daley family, Harbour's firms have longheld exclusive construction contracts at O'Hare Airport. Harbour isalso close to Tadin. They created Arsenal Materials along with PeterFerro to develop a railroad yard on the site of the former JolietArsenal in southwestern Will County.

Patrick Huels

Daley's handpicked alderman was forced to resign in 1997 after theChicago Sun-Times disclosed that his security firm got a $1.25million loan from Tadin. The loan came after Huels helped Tadin win acity subsidy to build his trucking headquarters in the 11th Ward.Tadin owns part of SDI, the company that provides security at Soxpark and at Tadin's trucking headquarters.

Fred Barbara

Barbara is a nephew of the late Chicago Ald. Fred Roti, whomfederal authorities say was a made member of the mob. Like Tadin,Barbara also had a big trucking business that did work for the city.The Bridgeport sons created T & B Ltd., buying land across the cityand leasing some of it to City Hall. They're no longer partners.Tadin still runs T & B, but it no longer has deals with the city.

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