City Council has removed the Municipal Historical Resource designation for both the Manie Opera Society building and Bow on Tong buildings, closing the chapter on the historical sites.
The two buildings were irrevocably damaged after a fire at the Bow on Tong building last January. After the fire, the Bow On Tong building was demolished and in May of last year city council approved the demolition of the Manie Opera Society building after the property owner brought an engineer report to council recommending demolition due to fire and water damage from the Bow On Tong fire. According to the city, the recommendation to tear down the building was the result of the owner’s lack of financial resources to stabilize it.
With both buildings already gone, Senior Community Planner for the city Ross Kilgour says removing the designation was more of an administrative exercise because the designation no longer served a purpose.
“There are no buildings there anymore so there is nothing to protect and if the owner decides to rebuild something different or sell the properties to someone else, the historic designations could potentially cause a bit of an issue,” Kilgour says.
He adds the province has already removed the historic designation the buildings were given in 2019.
With the designations being removed from the two properties there are now 28 properties in the City of Lethbridge with Municipal Historic Resource designations. Kilgour explains the designation is attached to the land title, so if the property is sold or transferred to another person the designation goes with it.
“It is a way to protect a building or another type of historic place for many years to come. It means if someone wants to make a change to an existing building that is designated they have to get an intervention approval from the city first.”
More information can be found on the city’s website.
