TALLAHASSEE — State Sen. Nick DiCeglie is being sued by his cousins and his family trash collection business for allegedly spending tens of thousands of dollars from the Clearwater company on political expenses, travel and a personal loan.
In two lawsuits, DiCeglie, a Republican from St. Petersburg, is accused of “embezzling” money while he was president of Solar Sanitation.
The most recent lawsuit, filed by Solar earlier this month, accuses DiCeglie of spending $65,000 of the company’s money to “pay vendors associated with DiCeglie’s political career.” That includes paying a consultant $2,500 a month between 2015 and 2018. He also spent more than $15,000 of the company’s money on membership fees, including at Tallahassee’s private Governor’s Club on Capitol Street, according to the demand
The company is seeking to recover the money. The lawsuits were first reported by the Florida Phoenix.
In legal filings, DiCeglie did not deny some of the allegations. He has agreed to pay back some of the money, including $120,000 in company loans.
But he said the political spending was to boost the company’s business, which relies on contracts with local governments in Pinellas County. A $5,000 payment to lobbyist Alan Suskey in 2016, for example, was to lobby the Legislature on an amendment affecting waste hauler travel provisions, he argued in court.
Much of the spending predates DiCeglie’s political career, which began when he was elected to the state House of Representatives in 2018. He was elected to the Senate last year, replacing Sen. Jeff Brandes, who was forced to resign due to term limits.
DiCeglie referred comment to his attorney, Richard Salazar, who described the lawsuits as a family dispute.
“Nick and his cousins are going through a business divorce, and like any divorce, each party is trying to gain leverage,” Salazar said in a statement. “This is nothing more than a last-ditch, desperate attempt to hurt Nick on his way to the negotiating table.”
Solar Sanitation was co-founded by DiCeglie’s father in 1980. DiCeglie inherited a third of the company around 2008 or 2009, according to court records. His cousins, Anthony Dinardi Jr. and John Dinardi, each have a one-third share that they inherited from their father. The Dinardis also own and operate a waste disposal company in New York.
DiCeglie became the company’s chairman in 2011. His cousins ”have rarely been involved in the management of Solar over the past 25 years,” he wrote in response to one of the lawsuits.
Although his cousins and the company accuse him of embezzling thousands of dollars, DiCeglie disputed many of the transactions in detail and disputed the lawsuits’ premise: that the money was being spent to help his personal political career.
“The reason Mr. DiCeglie got involved in politics was to benefit Solar,” one of his statements says. Between 2009 and 2013, he fought a Pinellas County Commission decision that would have put Solar “out of business,” his lawyers wrote, and has been active in politics ever since.
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The cousins accuse him of hiring a $2,500-a-month political consultant from January 2015 to July 2018 “solely for the personal benefit of DiCeglie in connection with his political career as a Florida legislator.”
DiCeglie responded that the consultant helped Solar with “an overall strategy on how to navigate various municipalities in Pinellas County and Pinellas County government.”
Membership in the Governor’s Club before his election, DiCeglie wrote, was “to have access to lobbyists and local elected officials on the status of their statewide waste hauling contracts, as well like storm debris business opportunities.”
A $1,500 payment to the St. Petersburg Republican Club was for Solar’s sponsorship of an awards dinner, the attorneys wrote. A $669 charge to a downtown Tallahassee hotel in January 2015 was for the governor’s inauguration, when DiCeglie “participated in several meetings with Pinellas County lobbyists to discuss their concerns with the carrier displacement statute,” their attorneys wrote.
DiCeglie agreed with the cousins on some of their allegations. He wrote that he would reimburse Solar for rent payments on a house in Tallahassee. It would return $139.75 for a stay at a Maine hotel in 2015 and $922.98 for a stay at the Sand Pearl Resort in Clearwater that were unrelated to company business.
He disputed that his actions hurt the company, instead pointing out that the company’s revenue rose 33%, or $1.5 million, over the past five years. The company had a record revenue of $4.4 million in 2022 and is projected to take in $5.3 million this year.
DiCeglie stepped down in February, but still owns a third of the company’s stock, valued at $1.75 billion in 2021, according to DiCeglie’s most recent financial disclosure.
