BANFF – Municipal grants to encourage property owners to save treasured heritage buildings from demolition in Banff may jump from $25,000 to $125,000.
As part of the annual review of municipal services, council has tentatively given the go-ahead to hike the grant amount and increase the existing $35,000 transfer to the heritage capital reserve over time – to $70,000 in 2025, $105,000 in 2026 and $125,000 in 2027.
Town of Banff officials say heritage properties are under pressure, with many demolished, at risk, or experiencing a declining state of repair, adding the existing grant is not enough to encourage developers to save the buildings.
“Over time, our ability to preserve heritage has been decreasing because our grant number has not been increasing in accordance to the value of the buildings and the costs of renovation to maintain heritage status,” said Coun. Chip Olver.
“To lose five buildings over three years is a hard loss for our community."
Banff’s draft heritage resource action plan recommends increasing the grant amount to encourage more owners to legally protect their heritage properties in perpetuity through a municipal designation bylaw.
The existing grant amount is limited to $25,000 for residential buildings or $50,000 for non-residential buildings.
There is $30,000 budgeted for heritage grants per year, with the balance of the reserve currently sitting at $170,000. The amount of funding available for heritage property owners through the grant program has not increased in 28 years.
A $50,000 grant was accessed by St. George-in-the-Pines in 2015 and for the Peter and Catharine Robb Whyte home in 2023, although there were no grant transactions for all other years from 2014 to 2023.
Darren Enns, director of planning and environment for the Town of Banff, said heritage property owners have indicated current grant amounts are unattractive and they would not be willing to designate their properties as municipal historic resources in exchange for the ability to access the funds offered.
In researching other Alberta municipalities, Enns said in Calgary, where residential grants are $125,000, a significant number of municipal historic resource designations come forward each year, including seven in 2020, 40 in 2021 and seven in 2022.
He said there are currently about 180 properties on Banff’s heritage inventory, noting 15 are designated as municipal historic resources, and of those, most are owned by either the Town of Banff or heritage foundation.
“The goal is to increase the uptake of our grant and by doing so increase the rate of designation for properties,” he said.
“To put it simply, our tools and tactics that we have right now are not working.”
Mayor Corrie DiManno spoke strongly in favour of increasing the grant and transfers to the heritage reserve over time.
“This amount of money in my mind is a small cost for the value of keeping heritage in our community … the cost of losing these heritage buildings is completely immeasurable to our community,” she said.
“Each time we talk about a demolition there’s a public outcry and I would just really love to be able to more substantially try and protect our built heritage and I see this as a very meaningful way that we can try to do that.”
Coun. Hugh Pettigrew was the lone voice of opposition.
“I am not against the idea, but against the timing,” he said, noting council approves three-year budgets so new initiatives should not be considered until 2026.
A final decision on the grant amount will be made when council deliberates the 2023-26 operating budget in January.
