Plans to tear down an A-ranked heritage home in Banff linked to prominent arts and drama promoter Margaret Greenham to make way for a new housing development has brought the issue of heritage protection to the political level.
On Monday (Jan. 8), council supported a motion by Councillor Peter Poole to have administration investigate policy options for a comprehensive and integrated heritage protection plan.
During debate on revised development fees, Poole wanted the fee schedule amended to include much steeper fees as a disincentive for developers knocking down important heritage buildings.
While council didn’t support making those adjustments to the fees Monday, it will be considered as part of a broader look at potential policy options that administration has been asked to bring to council this year.
Poole said he’s concerned the Town hasn’t been able to create a sufficient policy structure for protection of important heritage buildings, such as the Mountain School and Greenham’s home.
“It just doesn’t seem that we have any current financial incentives in the development fees protecting heritage buildings,” said Poole, a heritage activist who saved the Old Crag Cabin at the time of his Bison Courtyard development on Bear Street.
As more redevelopment to create housing continues to occur, there is a fear there will be ongoing loss of important heritage properties. There’s no new land in Banff, so any development is redevelopment and requires knocking down buildings.
Cameriam Properties, owned by New York Rangers’ President Glen Sather and local John Dowson, was given a development permit last month for four-plex housing at 606 and 608 Caribou Street.
The company plans to demolish the near century-old historic Mountain House, a private school run by Margaret and Henry Greenham between 1922 and 1947, as part of redevelopment plans, and the former Greenham residence.
Banff Heritage Corporation opposed demolition of the Mountain School. During the Second World War many British parents, including actress Vivien Leigh, enrolled their children there.
Margaret Greenham was a strong promoter of the dramatic arts in Banff, and organized the Banff Literary Dramatic Society and the first children’s theatre group in Alberta.
The Greenham’s cultural activities contributed to the establishment of the Banff School for Fine Arts, now Banff Centre, which includes a theatre named in Margaret’s honour.
Typically in Alberta, unilateral heritage protection requires compensation to property owners.
Banff, however, has a voluntary program for heritage protection, offering a financial incentive by way of grant in aid of property taxes or a rehabilitation-restoration grant. Several properties have taken advantage of this.
Darren Enns, the Town’s manager of development services, said there is currently no differential rate within the land use bylaw fee schedule for properties to be developed, but one suggestion would be an index fee schedule according to heritage value.
“The more valuable a property from a heritage perspective, the more expensive it becomes to redevelop it,” he said.
But Enns also told council development fees could be just one of several options to protect heritage properties.
“A suite of options might include things like density bonusing, which is a usual heritage protection measure in other communities,” he said. Density bonuses essentially allow a developer a chance to increase density of a project if the developer agrees to rehabilitate and legally protect any heritage buildings.
Coun. Chip Olver, who sat on the Banff Heritage Corporation last term, said she supports looking at public policy tools for heritage preservation, but also wants options for funding looked at.
“If we’re going the route of reimbursement, which Alberta requires, then our reserves are woefully inadequate,” she said.
In September, Banff Heritage Corporation recommended council transfer $30,000 a year to the heritage reserve, instead of the current $15,000.
The undedicated balance in the heritage reserve was forecast to be $90,000 at the end of 2017.
“A number of years ago the heritage reserve was upward of $300,000 and the reserve now is below $100,000,” said Olver.
“If there’s anything we want to do here with heritage protection, I don’t think that reserve is healthy enough to allow us to step forward.”
Meanwhile, a provincial heritage grant of $32,000 will help restore and maintain some of Banff’s most historical landmarks.
Of the funding, $12,000 will go toward restoring Rundle rock masonry on the Bow River Bridge, built in 1921.
The balance of funding will be shared between restoration projects at the Old Banff Cemetery, established in 1890 and the resting place of Banff’s pioneers, and the Banff Substation, built in 1905 to house a transformer receiving electricity from the Bankhead mines.
