Earlier this month North Hastings Community Trust announced that it will be gifting their building to the Canadian Peace Museum.
The museum will take over 19 Valleyview Drive (located near the Highway 28 Tim Hortons just south of Bancroft).
The organization said that stewarding the building was beyond their capacity.
“By transferring stewardship of the building, North Hastings Community Trust can continue to focus its energy and commitment to long lasting community building…The transfer is supported by the original anonymous benefactor of the building.”
Trust board Chair Lorie Byrd said shared values with the museum factored into the decision.
“We knew fairly quickly that our values were in alignment and some of those values are peace building and conflict resolutions, equity and inclusion, environmental stewardship, education and awareness, community engagement. These are really important values that not only do the peace museum have, but also North Hastings Community Trust has upheld.”
Peace Museum president and co-founder Chris Houston has worked with humanitarian agencies such as the Red Cross and the United Nations where he has experienced war first-hand.
He notes that the aim of the museum is to highlight the connections between “peace, conflict, equity, cohesive communities, art, activism and climate change.”
Houston told MooseFM that the museum is glad to support the building vision of the community trust.
“[We are] happy with their trust in us to steward the asset in a way that lets us run a peace museum, which the world needs right now. And I just think it’ll be really good for Bancroft and, also, to earmark some of that space for other groups to do peace and community related [projects].”
“They’re giving us the building and the lands with obligations to keep the community garden running and to use the space for community and we’re happy to support that. Overall, we’re absolutely delighted and grateful.”
Houston feels that the gift will make it easier to get people on board to support the museum.
“I spent the past year and a half asking for support and telling people about our dream and how to get there. It doesn’t seem real to many people until you have bricks and mortar identified. We have people who kindly supported us through donations. They trusted us..but it will be easier, I think, for people to support us now that we’ve got a physical space.”
When MooseFm spoke with Houston by phone, he was travelling with museum consultant Hugh Spencer of The Museum Planners Group.
“The donation of the building and the site… It’s a huge leap-frog ahead for the project. And it’s very much a part of the kind of museum we need right now.” said Spencer
You can learn more about North Hastings Community Trust here.
You can learn more about the Canadian Peace Museum here.
