Town to distribute nearly $50,000 in grant funding for restoration of heritage properties

May 18, 2023 · 0 Comments

By Zachary Roman

Some heritage properties in Caledon will soon have preservation work done thanks to funding from the Town.

At Caledon Council’s May 16 Planning and Development meeting, Council approved on consent a staff report which recommended approval of designated heritage property grant funding for ten recipients.

The report was submitted to Council by Cassandra Jasinski, Heritage Planner at the Town of Caledon.

Jasinski’s report explained that Caledon’s Designated Heritage Property Grant (DHPG) program “provides financial assistance to owners of properties designated under Part IV or Part V of the

Ontario Heritage Act for the conservation of their cultural heritage resources.”

Each year, in the Spring and Fall, Caledon accepts applications to the DHPG program. If a property owner applies for funding twice in a year, they can’t apply again the next year.

The program provides property owners with 50 per cent of eligible preservation work costs, up to a maximum of $6,000 per grant.

The 2023 budget for the DHPG program is $80,000. There’s also an additional $8,617.21 available from the Town’s 2022 Heritage Property Reserve.

Of the 10 property owners that submitted applications for grant funding this spring, five of their applications were eligible as submitted and another five were eligible with conditions. The applications totalled over $208,000 of private investment into cultural heritage resources in Caledon.

Between the ten recipients, $46,238.18 of grant funding will be distributed this spring.

A total of $2,514.25 is going towards work at the Boston Mills Cemetery to hand-clean headstones using brushes and chemicals that will not harm stonework. The goal is to stop deterioration of monuments by removing lichen moss and dirt.

The maximum amount of $6,000 is going to a property on Chapel Street to remove vines, and repair original elements of the building like doors and windows.

The Hector McLeish House on Horseshoe Hill Road is having $2,751.55 dedicated to installing custom wooden doors to replace unoriginal metal screen doors.

A total of $4,500 is being dedicated to work on a property on King Street West in Bolton. The money is going towards repair of exterior brickwork that will match the building’s original brickwork.

The maximum amount of $6,000 is being dedicated to work on the Alton Baptist Church. The grant funding will be used to replace the existing metal roof with a new standing seam metal roof.

Meanwhile, $1,949.25 is going towards work on the Bolton United Church. It needs its eavestroughs and downspouts replaced as they were previously patched and are now beyond repair.

For two properties on Queen Street North, $6,000 and $4,873.13 respectively will go towards restorations like doors, windows, and roofs.

The Wright-Didd House on Queen Street East will see $6,000 coming its way to aid in repainting original exterior elements of the house, as well as repairing dry rot on wooden elements prior to painting.

Finally, $5,650 will be heading to the Robin Hill Farm on The Grange Side Road to replace a historic porch, building the new one in the same style with hand-hewn wood.

The DHPG program first began in 2010, and has seen a few iterations since then to increase the amount of funding available for recipients and the breadth of work that can be completed under it.