The Trailer Park Boys franchise finished filming its third movie at St. Pat’s-Alexandra last Wednesday. The production paid the city $1,000 a week to use the former school, giving HRM $6,000 in revenue over the course of the shoot. But that cash is only a drop in the bucket when the city seems to be creating its own sequel to real estate-nightmare flick The Money Pit.
HRM has spent more than $650,000 since it gained possession of the vacant school in 2011. That’s for minimum maintenance, utilities and security, totalling about $210,000 over the 2011-12 fiscal year and $322,568 so far in 2012-13. By comparison, the recent concert scandal cost just under $360,000.
St. Pat’s is a problem the city made for itself. In the summer of 2011, HRM publicly asked for proposals for the property, and that December council voted to sell it to Jono Developments. But the sale contravened a city policy giving non-profit groups first dibs on old school buildings, so three non-profits that had also submitted proposals for St. Pat’s took the city to court.
Instead of using in-house lawyers, the municipality outsourced, costing a further $100,000. HRM lost the court case.
In recent months, the legal firm Pink Larkin sought costs associated with its pro-bono representation of the three community groups. The firm was awarded $7,531.43 from Jono Developments and $22,594.29 from the city.
HRM plans to consult the Gottingen-area community in late spring or early summer about future use of the school site. The city will then solicit proposals from non-profit groups. The three groups that took HRM to court plan to re-apply.
The groups asked permission to use the former school for a Christmas party and tree-lighting ceremony last December, but HRM denied their request, citing safety concerns: The groups didn’t have the minimum $2 million liability insurance, says HRM spokesperson Tiffany Chase.
“If anything were to happen in relation to the event, HRM would have been liable,” Chase says. The Trailer Park Boys’ insurance covered up to $10 million.
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This article appears in Apr 25 – May 1, 2013.
One very large community centre with a truckload of programs for youth. HRM doesn’t need the money from a sale, they just posted a $26,000,000 surplus and have spent vast sums elsewhere for hockey rinks, a very fancy new library.
A solid commitment to the adjacent community is required. Just do it.
Savage is slowly morphing into Kelly.
Sell the property, this area needs rejuvenation not more buildings that no one can afford to maintain unless they constantly come to the city for more and more money.
Ideally, we’d see the original Victorian school building preserved and renovated as community space (or residences) and the 1970s addition demolished for a new structure (ahem, condos? I wouldn’t be opposed). I think a lot of us fear, unfortunately, that the whole site will instead languish in a bureaucratic mire for years.
If the non-profits are really serious, they’d better put together some viable proposals, not the usual “oh, this would be nice, and maybe this, and la-de-da” usually heard. It completely destroys their credibility when they can’t come up with a solid, workable plan. It would also be nice if they weren’t so opposed to the idea of some market-rate housing on the site–it could help bankroll everything else they want to do. A neighbourhood entirely comprised of subsidized housing is a ghetto, and that’s not a progressive approach to city building. Affordable housing AND market rate can occupy the same location.
Any, potential model would be Toronto’s Shaw Street Public School, a 19th-century school declared surplus by the local board, and renovated by a group called Artscape, who turned into a fantastic arts and rec centre.
See: http://www.torontoartscape.org/news/artsca…
So one story “supports” the other. The concert scandal HAS to be compared to this story. There are wastes of money everywhere motivation is the factor in wrong doing.
I hope you’re joking.