Deal faces big debt, won't seek bankruptcy

ATLANTA - Republican gubernatorial candidate Nathan Deal said Wednesday that he faces financial troubles after backing a failed venture by one of his daughters and her husband, but he insisted he won't file for bankruptcy to help repay the debts.

Deal and his wife Sandra invested about $2 million in the failed sporting goods store in northeast Georgia, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Wednesday. The report said Deal's debts exceed his assets, and he faces a Feb. 1 deadline to pay back a $2.3 million bank loan.

The former congressman said at a hastily called press conference in north Atlanta that he intends to pay off the debts in full, but he would not address how he plans to do so. He sought to depict his financial troubles as proof that he faces the same economic turmoil as Georgia voters.

"I am real. I'm like other Georgians. I face these same challenges. Like other Georgians, we're going to be responsible," he said. "We're going to stand by our children. We believe that's the right thing to do. We did it then and we will stand by them now."

Deal and his wife lost their entire stake in sporting goods store Wilder Outdoors when the business failed, according to the newspaper's report. It said the Deals also guaranteed a series of bank loans to the business and wound up with the financial responsibility after their daughter and son-in-law, Carrie Deal Wilder and Clint Wilder, declared bankruptcy.

"He lost a lot of money," Brian Robinson, a spokesman for Deal's campaign, told the newspaper. "He lost $2 million off the top, and there's another $2 million he's on the hook for."

Deal's Gainesville home was listed for sale about a year ago for $985,000 to help meet his financial obligations, the newspaper reported. The 5-acre property, which he bought seven years ago for $430,000, features a main house, a guest house and a pool, the report said.

He also is trying to sell the Wilder Outdoors property in Habersham County, which is valued at about $700,000, the newspaper reported. The 14,000-square-foot building in northeast Georgia now sits empty.

Wilder Outdoors opened for business in November 2006, and Deal said it met with early success. But the newspaper reported by the time it had been open seven months, the store had accumulated almost $1.8 million in debt. The store shut its doors for good in March 2009.

Deal said he decided to invest in the store after his daughter and her husband asked him to. He said his son-in-law was traveling five days a week, and that he and his wife "thought it would be a good idea to keep him closer to home."

"It was an investment that me and my wife made because that's what parents do. We think parents help their children," he said. "We've always had the philosophy that our children, when they need help, it's important to give it to them when they need it and not be so concerned about leaving them a big estate."

Much of Deal's debt is owed to a South Carolina bank, SCBT, which acquired Community Bank and Trust of Cornelia after regulators shut it down in January. The north Georgia bank granted a loan of about $1 million for the store in 2006, increased it by $252,000 in 2007 and made a new loan of $2.4 million in 2008, the newspaper said.

Deal said the failed venture and his troubled financial situation should not be exploited in his campaign to defeat Democrat Roy Barnes.

"I've made good investments in the past and I've made a bad investment," he said. "But I stick by my obligations. But more importantly, I stick by my family."