Tatamagouche residents worry about loss of green space as province plans to build housing

Some residents of Tatamagouche, N.S., say they are worried about losing a large green space in the Colchester County community as the province prepares to create more housing for health-care workers in the area.

The green space that sits near the local school, library and the Lillian Fraser Memorial Hospital has been a gathering place for social events and sports for more than 50 years.

Erin Pope, a longtime resident who works as a nurse at the local hospital, said she’s upset the province is reportedly considering the space as a place to build housing. She said patients have appreciated the view of the green space during her 20 years working at the hospital.

“That’s not something we wanted for that field,” Pope told CBC Radio’s Information Morning Halifax. 

“Housing is a problem and health care is also a problem, but there [are] other spaces in the community that are also walking distance to the hospital and the local nursing home that could be used … it’s the heart of the community.”

Pope said community members have been writing letters to local officials hoping to prevent the proposed site from being developed, but the area was staked off as of Thursday.

Colchester County Mayor Christine Blair said the municipality learned about the proposed development in recent weeks.

The provincial government has been working to build more homes for health-care workers amid a housing crisis and health-care woes.

In March 2023, the province announced it would build more modular housing for health-care workers after identifying areas with acute need that also had provincially owned land available.

CBC News contacted the Department of Municipal Affairs and Housing for an interview on Friday, but a spokesperson provided a statement instead. 

It said the Nova Scotia Housing Trust is reviewing a “number of potential sites around the province that may be suitable for housing, including additional opportunities in the Colchester County area.”

Province owns property

Blair said the municipality has no control over what happens with the land because it’s owned by the Chignecto Central Regional Centre for Education.

In an email, the education centre said it’s in the process of transferring property ownership to Municipal Affairs and Housing.

Blair said she understands there is a need for more housing, but the 1.6-hectare green space has served the community for decades. 

“It serves a purpose for events, for a small park, for children playing, for sports, sporting events for the school,” Blair told Information Morning early Friday. “It’s something that is an asset to the community as it currently exists.”

Blair said in the past the municipality has offered to purchase the entirety of the land from the regional centre for education, and also just a piece of it, but they were denied both times. She said the reason they were given was that “the province wanted it for housing.”

She said there are other locations in the area that could be purchased by the province, or agreements could be worked out with local facilities and businesses to house workers.

“It would certainly, I think, be less expensive to pay for room in the bed and breakfast and provide money to the local economy, than it is to build a several-unit apartment building to house workers on a field where the residents of Tatamagouche would rather see left open.”

Blair and Pope agree that public consultation about the proposed development is needed.

“I’d like them to inform the whole community — not hearsay — and inform people of what is going on and give them the option to have a meeting and see if this is what people really want,” Pope said.