In 2007, to help raise money for his legal defense, Fumo put his mansion on the market for $7 million. (Since then, the asking price has dropped to $5.5 million.)
The gulf between the mansion's tax bill and asking price quickly became an embarrassment for the BRT, a particularly striking example of the irrationality of many of its assessments.
Even then, the board at first voted, 4-3, not to raise the mansion's value, with Russo and Levin siding with the senator.
"I would vote exactly the same way," Levin said, explaining that it was wrong to single Fumo out for a tax hike. "It was spot-assessing. When we reassessed it as part of a larger group of properties, I voted for it."
In March 2008, Levin and other board members hiked the value of Fumo's mansion to $953,500, raising his tax bill 281 percent. Fifty other high-end properties got similar treatment. Fumo appealed, but in January, the BRT shot him down in a unanimous vote. Levin and Russo were absent.
Thwarted by Hunter, Fumo eventually gave up and moved on. The Independence Charter School, with a loan from Citizens' Alliance, found a building in Center City.
Less than a year after he refused Fumo's $600,000, Hunter sold the school for $1 million to a condo developer; the building is now 11 luxury condos, a project that helped turn around that section of Queen Village.
With the profits, Hunter and his wife painstakingly converted the convent into their dream home. The former nuns' chapel is now a study for Sheila Hunter.
Whatever happened at the BRT after Fumo's intervention, the message was lost on Hunter. When first asked about the matter, after the e-mails surfaced at Fumo's trial, he told The Inquirer his assessment had not been raised.
He didn't remember that his taxes had indeed gone up until reporters showed him the records. If he was punished for crossing Fumo, no one ever told him.
Today, he's left with a mixture of irritation and admiration for Fumo's relentlessness. As an activist - Hunter is trying to build urban greenhouses to provide jobs for ex-offenders - he saw the same Fumo tactics pay off in money and projects for the neighborhood.
"Wouldn't you like a Gen. Patton on your side?" he asked. "In that world, who wouldn't want someone like that?"
To read the series online and check out special interactive features, go to http://go.philly.com/brt
Contact staff writer Joseph Tanfani at 215-854-2684 or jtanfani@phillynews.com.
Staff writer Craig R. McCoy contributed to this article.
