Site for proposed Catholic high school in north London clears hurdle

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A plan to demolish a nearly 150-year-old north London home and build a Catholic high school on the site, a top priority for the fast-growing London-area Catholic board, cleared a key hurdle Tuesday.

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All five members of city council’s planning and environment committee – councillors Steve Lehman, Shawn Lewis, Peter Cuddy, Elizabeth Peloza and Steven Hillier – gave their support, without a word, to remove a home at 1927 Richmond St. from the heritage registry.

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The London District Catholic school board said it has an agreement with the home’s owner to buy the property to build a high school.

The two-storey home south of Sunningdale Road, built in 1877 according to a city staff report, fell short of meeting the minimum threshold of two of nine criteria for cultural, historical or architectural significance to qualify for heritage protection.

City staff recommended removing the home from the heritage registry, despite 18 of the 22 letters sent to the committee calling for the building to be preserved.

“The staff report was pretty clear, the (planning) advisory committee was fine with taking it off the heritage list,” Lehman, the committee chair, said of the committee’s decision. “Even though today we weren’t really discussing zoning for a school, I think that was in the back of a lot of people’s heads.”

During a meeting of the planning advisory committee in November, the executive superintendent of business and corporate services for London District Catholic board said in a letter the board had entered into an agreement to purchase the property and surrounding land for a new high school.

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“The establishment of a new Catholic high school in this location is crucial to providing adequate educational services to the area,” Debbie Jordan wrote. “Given the planned development for low-, medium-, and high-density housing in this area, there will be a significant shortage of space for students.”

In another letter to the committee for Tuesday’s meeting, Jordan emphasized the shortage of high school space in north London, the lack of alternative land, and the proximity of the CF Masonville Place transit hub.

A new north London high school has been at the top of the London District Catholic board’s wish-list for some time, with enrolment pressures forcing the board to spend $5 million on 57 portable classrooms at its schools.

The London-based Catholic board, the fastest growing Catholic board in Ontario, gained more than 1,500 students this year for a total of 27,500 students at 54 schools. The board has added nearly 6,400 students since 2020, enough to fill about 20 elementary schools. 

Whether a school is ultimately built on the land will depend funding on from the province. The board already has submitted a formal request for a secondary school in northwest London to accommodate 2,000 students.

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Lehman said he’s seen school boards run into trouble before requesting and getting approval for a new school from the province, but not having the land or zoning available.

“This is one opportunity maybe to get the horse in front of the cart, so to speak, in maybe allocating some land for a school,” he said. “Hopefully the school board can get the OK from the province to take advantage of this.”

City council still has to give final approval to the committee recommendation to remove the home from the heritage registry.

The population of London and Middlesex County, already facing steep population growth in recent years, is expected to swell by more than 50 per cent during the next 25 years, putting pressure on everything from home building, to health care and schools.

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