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Politics

Crist is going places, with help

The candidate's affluent friends make their jets available to hop around the state.

By STEVE BOUSQUET
Published October 28, 2006

TALLAHASSEE - Charlie Crist has friends in high places who help him get places.

The friends are rich and they own corporate jets. They are developers, chiropractors, investors and operators of private prisons and fitness clubs.

By law, Crist's campaign must reimburse the planes' owners for their use, but at a bargain rate. The law sets the rate as the commercial coach fare for the same route, usually a fraction of a flight's true cost.

Ironically, the case that established the cheaper rate for candidates resulted from a complaint filed against Crist and dismissed in 2002, the year he was elected attorney general.

The Florida Elections Commission ruled that the value of a corporate flight should be a comparable commercial flight to the same city, not the much higher fair market value of the flight, as the complaint charged.

Crist claims he often doesn't know whose plane he's in. But his extensive use of corporate jets offers another view of his network of supporters.

The owners include Greg Eagle, a Cape Coral real estate developer; Gary Kompothecras, a chiropractor in Sarasota; Stuart Lasher of Tampa, an investor whose interests include Lifestyle Family Fitness centers; Randy Perkins, president of AshBritt, a Pompano Beach company holding large government contracts for post-hurricane debris removal; Harry Sargeant, owner of Sargeant Marine in Boca Raton and Crist's fraternity brother in Pi Kappa Alpha at Florida State; and George Zoley, chairman of the GEO Group of Boca Raton, which runs private prisons in Florida.

Crist said the airborne assistance comes with no strings attached.

"They adopt my agenda, not the reverse," he said. "Nobody's asked me for anything."

Campaign spending reports show Crist has spent more than $100,000 on airfare reimbursement. The figure is based on expenditures listed as airfare reimbursement or travel reimbursement, excluding repayments to his campaign workers.

Reporters following Crist to appearances tag along on press planes provided by supporters. Media outlets reimburse the campaign for their share, at the same reduced rate.

Crist is hardly the first candidate to rely on corporate jets. Florida's size makes it impossible for statewide candidates moving by car to stay visible for long.

He traveled Thursday on a Gulfstream jet owned by United Capital Markets, a Key Biscayne financial company whose president gave $40,000 to the Republican Party of Florida this year.

Crist's Democratic opponent, Jim Davis, has also flown on corporate jets, but far less frequently. Two examples include jets owned by Jim Pugh, a Winter Park builder and leading Democratic Party donor, and Capital Holdings, a Miami financial services company.

Davis spokesman Josh Earnest said it is more common for the candidate to fly commercial.

Times staff writer Alex Leary and researcher Angie Drobnic Holan contributed to this report. Steve Bousquet can be reached at bousquet@sptimes.com.

[Last modified October 27, 2006, 23:48:10]