Sands Point resident drops contribution complaint

Sands Point resident Richard Crawford dropped his complaint with the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation’s Division of Florida Condominiums, Timeshares and Mobile Homes, in which he claimed that the Sands Point Condominium Association did not have the right to use its association funds for Islandside Property Owners Coalition (IPOC) contributions.

Crawford said that he agreed to withdraw his complaint after agreeing to “bury the hatchet” in a meeting with three Sands Point board members shortly after the condominium’s Nov. 15 annual meeting in which he announced the complaint, which he filed in August. He said that he also agreed to drop a complaint he planned to file against Sands Point’s E&O insurance policy.

However, a Dec. 15 letter from the division states:

“The Division has determined, concurrent with the complainant’s request to withdraw his complaint, that the Association, after receiving the county notice of public hearing, had a right to use Association funds related to the opposing of the nearby development, if they choose to do so. No violation has been found and the case will be closed.”

Crawford, who with his wife, Marsha, founded Positive Change of Longboat Key to support the Key Club’s project, filed the claim independently and not as a representative of the group.

Sands Point Board President Julian Hansen sent a Dec. 28 memorandum to unit owners informing them that the case had been dropped. In the memo, Hansen wrote that the association spent $7,600 responding to the complaint.

However, Crawford accused Hansen of not adhering to their “hand-shake” agreement. He said that the bulletin “totally misstates what actually transpired with no mention that I worked along with the board to withdraw my complaint, called off legal action and never filed under our E&O Policy. There is no mention that our board is still under investigation for not having mandatory audits as per Florida Condo Code,” Crawford wrote in an email to the Longboat Observer.

However, Hansen defended his decision to send the memo.

“The bulletin was sent out to let other members know exactly what was going to happen,” he said. “He started the thing, and the Division finished the thing.”