City puts historic St. Boniface city hall up for sale

The City of Winnipeg is looking to sell St. Boniface's old city hall buildingand the fire hall behind it.

The city issued a request this weekforplans to convert orpotentially expand the existing buildings. Redevelopment could prove challenging, however, due to heritage designations.

The iconic city hall buildingboasts an elegant brick exterior topped by a majestic clock tower that looks over Provencher Boulevard.

Now, it leases space to local non-profit organizations such as Tourisme Riel, World Trade Centre Winnipegand La Maison des Artistes Visuels Francophones. The tenants pay rent of $1 per year, according to the request for proposals.

The fire hall was once a museum, and still holds a number of artifacts from when it was open. Both buildings were constructed between 1905 and 1907.

Challenging to renovate

The buildings sit on the city's historical resources list, meaning they are subject to certain heritage protections.

The entire exterior of both buildings are protected. In the old city hall , the main floor, second floor, stairwayand clock tower all must be preserved under the city's heritage protection bylaw.

This would pose a significant challenge to any developer who wants to take them over, said Philippe Mailhot, aformer director of the St. Boniface Museum.

"In other words, somebody can't essentially buy this building, gut it, and turn it into condos or something like that. They have to retain a lot of that original interior configuration, exterior architecture and so on and so forth," he said, adding that he'd like to see the building remain open to the public.

"The building is still an integral part of the St. Boniface community, of the Francophone community here. So I think it would be frankly tragic to see it lost to the public, to public use."

Normand Gousseau, chief executive officer of Enterprises Riel, agrees. He said he thinks the old city hall would be particularly difficult to reinvent because of its design.

"It wasn't designed as a rental space, it was designed as a city hall, it was purpose built," he said.

"Can something be done? there are more creative people than that will come up with some ideas I'm sure. It will be interesting to see for sure."

The city hopes to find a successful buyer for the buildings by November 2021.