is Now Officially Unknown
Note: If you are already familiar with the issue and want to show your support quickly, there is now a more direct way to indicate your opposition to the subdivision and sale of a piece of the common land here: A Simple Request
Update March 14, 2020
I still intend to pursue this issue. I am NOT going to give up. Neither Ralph Bayer or anyone else should be able to obtain any piece of our common lands. Ever. I hope the rest of the owners agree and will join me as a group to formally take legal action if necessary.
For now, I ask you indicate your agreement with my Demand Letter and Settlement Offer (in letter and below) by submitting the below form. (there’s another one at the bottom after you read the background article from October. All the legal documents and opinions are also linked below.)
Note: To prevent non-owners and repeat submissions, the script that processes the form will compare your name and lot number to our database and look for an exact match. Please use the name that appeared first on your registration or it will not go through. Don’t worry, you will get a chance to come back and try again if you didn’t see/read/heed this warning, or can’t remember whose name you put first. Thanks. Contact me at stan@abbecombec.ca if you still have a problem.
Update February 12, 2020
I have just been informed by my lawyer that Mr. Larry Dunn, did confirm he received the letter only recently, after denying he had received the initial one, and we finally sent a second demand for a response. However he still did not offer any response. He did, however, force my law firm to withdraw from the matter by claiming a sort of conflict of interest as HarbourEdge had apparently at one time used the firm for an unrelated matter in another province. So basically I’m SOL on this issue. Again.
I will refrain from putting into print my verbal reaction to this long and expensive and ultimately ridiculous matter. There is and remains absolutely no reason this should have become an issue that required legal consultation. All they had to do was do what they were legally bound to do. If anyone wants to invest with me to buy the damn place so we can assure it is run ethically and properly, please contact me ASAP.
Hurricane Dorian Cleanup Proposals
October 18, 2020
Those of you who are residents already know that Hurricane Dorian blew the roof off of the rear section of what is known as the Rec Center or the Green building which is specifically listed as common property in the license agreement and sits within our common lands.
If you are a resident you also know that we have not had use of the building since some time shortly after HarbourEdge took ownership of the development in 2013 and Mr. Ralph Bayers, a local contractor, was given permission to store his maintenance equipment there.
Soon thereafter Mr. Bayers took exclusive possession of the building and it was quickly filled with vehicles, boats, jet skis, motorcycles, and other personal items. Rumours abounded that he rented out storage space to outside community individuals. Many outside individuals were observed coming and going to the building over the years with their vehicles. Several of these individuals openly told other owners that they paid Ralph Bayers to store their possessions there. Several owners asked if they could store their items in the building and were denied use by Mr. Bayers.
This denial of use is in direct violation of the license agreement that we, the owners, must be given access to the common lands. This use continued with HarbourEdge’s permission and despite many formal complaints from myself and other owners.
I then obtained, at my own considerable expense, several legal opinions that found that HarbourEdge had committed multiple violations of our license agreement by giving Mr. Bayers exclusive use and by refusing to dedicate any funds from our maintenance fees toward keeping the buildings ‘in a reasonable state of repair.’
- Opinion Letter 1 re. Use of Common Lands “It is my opinion that a conveyance or sale to a party other than the Co-Op could be challenged.”
- Opinion Letter 2 re. Use of Common Lands “It is also my opinion that allowing the common areas to fall into disrepair is a clear violation of this obligation. In addition, the demolition of common areas, and structures, which existed at the time of contract, may also be a violation.”
- The Demand Letter is available as a PDF at this link:
Demand Letter to HarbourEdge
Supporting Documents
Then came Hurricane Dorian and that took care of the demolition. The entire rear portion of the building is basically destroyed. The roof is blown off and lies on an adjacent lot and nearly all of the cinder block walls have collapsed. Many stored vehicles were damaged or rendered useless.
HarbourEdge informed us via Brian McCourt that Mr. Bayers had given a bid of $71,000 to clean up the mess. The work was not tendered for offers and no other bids were taken (to my knowledge at the time of this writing.) It was further communicated that he had offered to do the cleanup in exchange for a deed to the green building and the brown building. (The brown building is owned outright by HarbourEdge on a separate lot and they have full rights to sell it as they see fit.)
The other option, we were told, was to add the $71,000 to the maintenance budget and spread the cost to all the owners. For Mr. Bayers to be the sole bidder for this project, for which he wants the building in return, is a clear conflict of interest and a lack of due diligence.
As the green building is part of the common lands, splitting it off is not possible according to my legal team, but HarbourEdge is reportedly having their legal team look into accomplishing this.
As I, and other owners I have spoken to, feel that it would be a very bad precedent to allow the common lands to be subdivided, and none of us want Mr. Bayers running a commercial business in the middle of our pristine environmentally sensitive wetlands, I have taken the further step, again at my own expense, to have my law firm draft a formal demand letter specifying the violations HarbourEdge has made against our contract with them and proposing a simple settlement.
Proposed Settlement
The settlement we propose would be for Mr. Bayers to clean up and remove the damaged section of the building at no cost to us and to vacate our building permanently and return its use to us in compensation for the 6 years he denied us our rightful use and made money by (allegedly) renting out storage space. This would also serve to settle any dispute with HarbourEdge for failing to maintain the building in a ‘reasonable state of repair’ as they were obligated to do with the funds they collected from the owners
The full demand letter is available as a PDF at this link:
Letter to HarbourEdge
I am requesting that if you support this position that you do two things.
First, indicate your support by ‘signing’ the letter by filling out the form below.
Then call or email Larry Dunn at HarbourEdge, 705.443.8156 or ldunn@harbouredge.com Please let him know personally how you feel about the fate of the green building and how we should address the cleanup of the hurricane destruction.
Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
Sign your support of our position by submitting this form:
Note: To prevent non-owners and repeat submissions, the script that processes the form will compare your name and lot number to our database and look for an exact match. Please use the name that appeared first on your registration or it will not go through. Don’t worry, you will get a chance to come back and try again if you didn’t see/read/heed this warning, or can’t remember whose name you put first. Thanks. Contact me at stan@abbecombec.ca if you still have a problem.