A piece of history, gone forever
Re: “The slow destruction of Harriet Cock House,” July 6, 2016
Dear Editor,
Mayor Henry, members of council… you need to do better. The people of Oshawa deserve it.
The Harriet Cock House is being torn down by development company RioCan. One of Oshawa’s earliest structures, which has “notable and significant architectural heritage value” and is “a rare example of the early frame building type,” is slated for destruction any day now.
Four years ago, the house was sturdy enough to be moved fairly easily to a new location, at a cost of about $45,000. Yet despite the building’s historic and architectural significance, city council removed it from the list of buildings to be deemed historic under the Ontario Housing Act.
Mayor John Henry’s response to the building’s annihilation is to state the obvious: “It’s unfortunate and it’s always sad to lose a piece of history.” Yes, it’s unfortunate and sad – especially when it was easily preventable and unnecessary. Failure to act led to this sad and unfortunate loss of a piece of Oshawa’s history.
Mind you, it seems that the mayor and councillors do act when land development companies ask them to. When RioCan requested that the Harriet Cock House be removed from the list of buildings to be designated as historic, this was done. As a result, the house was removed from protection and can now be destroyed, which is what RioCan now plans to do because it’s cheaper to bulldoze a building than it is to move it.
The mayor stated, “The challenge is we don’t own the property.” A bigger challenge, perhaps, is his and city council’s incompetence in the matter. Had the building remained on the list and been declared historic, it would have been saved from destruction.
There’s more.
In a recent letter to the city – a letter in which RioCan stated its intention to destroy the Harriet Cock House – RioCan included a cheque for $15,000. By bulldozing the Harriet Cock House, they’re saving themselves $45,000, giving a third of this sum to the city and pocketing the rest themselves.
None of this is to suggest that the mayor and council members are naive or gullible. Just because RioCan promised to move the building, and just because they then asked council not to have the building declared historic, and just because they subsequently announced plans to raze the building rather than keep their word and move it…
Mayor Henry’s comment about the $15,000 cheque from RioCan is that, “It’s an opportunity for the city to get something.” We may be losing an architecturally significant and historic, rare building, but RioCan’s benevolent generosity will help pay for a display case that could contain a few artefacts from the soon-to-be-destroyed structure. Wow! What an opportunity! Who needs to see the actual house, when we can look at a photograph of it in a display case?
Presenting the loss of the Harriet Cock House as an opportunity is shameful. Mayor Henry and members of council certainly bungled this one. It would be refreshing to hear an apology being offered, instead of more excuses and platitudes about “opportunities.”
Mayor Henry added, “I’m hoping that RioCan continues to do what they promised in the north end of the city, and I have all the expectations of that.” Unfortunately, it seems the mayor doesn’t learn from mistakes. He hopes RioCan will do what they promised, yet they just showed us all by their actions that they don’t honour their word. When people unmask their true character, you can hope and pray and expect that it just isn’t so, but the only person you’re fooling is yourself – and perhaps Mayor Henry and members of council.
Dave Melnychuk