Court documents show that a bank is garnishing the wage of Tampa’s city council chairman for unpaid loans used for his personal business.
As of August 2022, Councilman Joe Citro owed $20,035 to Bank of America, Hillsborough County court documents show. The lawsuit says that Citro took out loans for his hairdresser business and didn’t pay them back.
A bank statement from 2018, which was included in the documents, shows that the bank was trying to collect the past owed debt from Citro before taking legal action. But when none of it was paid, the bank filed a lawsuit against him in 2019.
Now, the bank is garnishing his city councilman wage—which is paid for by Tampa taxpayers—and the City of Tampa is named as a garnishee in the case.
Citro, who is running for District 1 reelection in March, told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay he would’ve paid the loans sooner and using the income from his personal business if it wasn’t for the COVID-19 pandemic.
“COVID hit me and my business very hard,” Citro said. “I had to shut down for months. And I did not get any relief from any type of state, federal, county or city programs. This is not something that I’m proud of, but it’s something that I’m getting through.”
Citro said that he’s almost paid off his debt through his councilman paycheck and that he was going to call the collections company to see if he could pay off the rest of it today.
But court documents show that as of last August, Citro had paid none of the sum that he owed. He said that since then, he’s paid off nearly all of the owed amount.
When asked if he thought if it was proper that his councilman wage should be used to pay off loans taken out for his private business, Citro said that he wasn’t the one who decided on that. He said that the plaintiff and the judge decided where the funds would be garnished from. CL has asked Lavin & Solis, PLLC, the firm representing Bank of America, to confirm this. CL also asked for confirmation on how much money Citro still owes.
The City of Tampa legal department has not yet responded to questions about Citro’s statements.
Last year, when city council voted on a potential pay raise for themselves, Citro argued against a raise and said, “Heck no!” during a vote on the issue. The motion failed.
Citro was appointed to council chair last year, after allegations from a former employee of councilman Orlando Gudes surfaced, and the position of chair was passed from Gudes to Citro. The lawsuit against Gudes was later dismissed in Hillsborough County court, but not before the City paid the former employee $200,000.
According to the city charter, if Mayor Jane Castor were ever unable to serve in her position, Citro, the council chair, would step in to fulfill mayoral duties.
So far, Citro has three opponents running against him for his council seat: Sonja P Brooking, Alan Clendenin and Chase Harrsion.
When asked for any other thoughts on his wages being garnished, Citro said that this kind of thing can happen to anyone.
“Not everybody’s life is perfect,” Citro said. “We’re all human.”
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