Jack Danylchuk
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Oct 19/05) - Another two pieces of Yellowknife's past were erased from Old Town last summer without protest from the city's Heritage Committee.

"I'm afraid our hands are tied," Catherine Pellerin, co-chair of the committee said this week when asked about two buildings demolished on Bretzlaff Ave.

Pellerin said the fate of the old laundry building and a former residence known as "slant six" never "came before us, so we didn't have an opportunity to make a decision one way or another."

Owned by the Rocher family, they were on the Heritage Committee's inventory of early Yellowknife buildings, but didn't carry a historic designation even though they are included in a brochure on the city's colourful past.

"Truly, there wasn't a decision to be made one way or another. These were not designated historical sites," Pellerin said. "If we hear that a building that is really vital is coming down then things can be done or steps taken, but we weren't in that position. There was absolutely nothing the committee could do. We can only respond to what comes before us."

Dave Jones, Yellowknife's manager of planning and lands, said Les Rocher asked to speak about the buildings at the committee's July meeting.

"He was thinking of demolishing or moving the buildings, and wanted to know if the committee was interested in them," Jones recalled.

"The heritage committee didn't push it; they didn't think there was anything they would be able to do with those buildings, and they didn't have any intent to take them on as a restoration project."

Rocher didn't attend the July meeting, so nothing came of it, Jones said.

In August, the buildings were demolished and the site was levelled and filled.

"The buildings were no good," Rocher said this week when asked about the demolition.

"Everything was rotten and mouldy. You couldn't use them for storage or anything. We took what was useable off them and the rest we hauled to where garbage goes."

A vintage log cabin survived the clearance and will remain "unless my father tells me to do something differently," Rocher said.

"We're not selfish or foolish. We've had this property for years. Any historic buildings that are salvageable, we're going to salvage."

Rocher said he was unaware that the demolition should have been part of a development permit, but Jones said "we don't have any concerns with him taking the buildings down."

Jones said the questions surrounding demolition of the laundry and slant six buildings are typical of problems that confront the city in preserving its past. "You have to have a location and purpose for the buildings," he said, acknowledging that the city has no budget or plan for saving historic structures.

"It hasn't been addressed, and there hasn't been any direction from the public or council to do that, so they haven't pursued do it," Jones said.