Halifax Council Votes For Public Hearing For Major Development In Preston Township
HALIFAX — Plans for a major development on the site of the former Nova Scotia Home for Coloured Children have cleared an important hurdle.
Halifax Regional Council voted last week to send the project to a public hearing, one of the final steps in the city’s development process.
The NSHCC property is owned by Akoma Holdings Incorporated, a social enterprise established in 2014 to take control of the land.
Spencer Colley, a member of Akoma’s board, told Huddle the approximately 315 acres of property is “the largest piece of property owned by a black institution, probably east of Montreal.”
Right now, Akoma operates a community centre and a few other buildings on the property, but most of the land has been sitting unused for decades.
Akoma has a seven-stage development plan for the property that would transform it into what Colley calls a “community within a community” that provides a range of economic and social opportunities to residents of the Preston Township.
The plan begins with completing renovations of the former home itself. Akoma hopes to have it named a heritage building and plans to transform it into an “intergenerational facility” full of commercial and community enterprises like a salon, gym, café, and community gathering spaces.
On the surrounding property, Akoma hopes to build an 80-unit seniors housing facility, followed by a mix of market-rate, affordable, and mixed-use housing.
Akoma also hopes to eventually build a children’s centre, sports field, graveyard, community garden, trail network, and more.
Colley says the project will bring much-needed housing to the area but also, hopefully, create work and other opportunities for community members.
The Nova Scotia Home For Coloured Children was established in 1921 because orphanages at the time wouldn’t house black children.
The home closed in the 1980s and over the past decade a public inquiry, court case, and testimonies of former residents revealed a history of abuse there. That abuse is just one piece of a complicated, and for some very painful, history of racism directed towards African Nova Scotians.
“Years ago, we were brought here and put on the land to die, but of course we [ended up] doing a lot. There was a lot of people who stayed here and created and made things, made the community what it is now,” Colley said.
Colley is a retired police officer and says he used to drive by the old NSHCC every day on his way to work. He watched the building slowly deteriorate over the years and joined Akoma’s board because he wanted to see something done about it.
He said establishing a community on the NSHCC land could help highlight the strength of the community and help forge a different narrative.
“We’ve got to start to do something … so our kids will be able to say—my grandchildren particularly—this is what happened then but look at us now,” Colley said.
However, Colley stressed that the project is ultimately about and for the entire community.
“It will be a development by a black organization, but it’s for everybody,” he said.
Right now, the NSHCC property is designated an Urban Reserve, a type of zoning that doesn’t support most of Akoma’s proposal.
Halifax Regional Municipality staff have suggested lifting that designation and adopting a new “Mixed Opportunity District” specifically for the property.
To make the project viable, the municipality would also have to extend its water service area to a large swath of the property that isn’t connected.
In a recent report on the project, HRM staff said that “given the scale, diversity of uses and overall investment required to achieve Akoma’s vision,” the full project will likely take more than a decade to complete.
Speaking about the proposal on April 6, councilor Becky Kent said the project is an opportunity to “change the trajectory of what we write, historically, now.”
“So many times I’ve passed that particular area and thought what’s going to happen, what’s going to happen—and I know residents and the public are saying the same thing,” Kent said. “I am so excited to see such a thoughtful and good potential opportunity here for the area, for the communities that have championed for change around this.”
Council’s vote to move the project forward means the next step is a full public hearing, where members of the public can give feedback on the project directly to council before itmakes its final decision.