The Prince George Heritage Commission is looking to advance the nomination of two buildings proposed to join the city’s heritage register years ago.
At the commission’s first meeting of 2025 on Thursday, March 13, heritage liaison Melissa Pritchard gave an update on heritage register applications for Knox United Church at 1448 Fifth Ave. and the home at 2299 Laurier Cres.
The commission nominated the church to join the heritage register back in 2016, before part of the building was redeveloped into what is now the Knox Performance Centre.
According to Pritchard’s report, the property’s previous owner signed a form granting consent for the building to be added to the register in May 2017 and council considered adding it to the register the following January.
However, the building was sold and the church was removed from the register, with the application remaining stagnant since.
The report recommends that the commission complete the formal evaluation process for the building as there is no record of it having been done previously. Once that is completed, the commission is recommended to review a draft statement of significance document outlining the building’s heritage value before entering consultations with the current owner.
A copy of that statement of significance document from 2017 is attached to the meeting agenda. It says the church opened in November 2022 and is “the only remaining Gothic Revival design in the City of Prince George.”
As of 2017, it was also one of only two buildings left in the city that were designed by architect Henry Wilson. Some of the trees on the lot were planted during landscaping work in 1933.
The Laurier Crescent home, also known as the “House by Greenwell,” was nominated for addition to the registry in June 2022 but the creation of a statement of significance was never completed.
City staff recommend that the statement be completed before consultations with the owner start.
The draft statement said that the house was built in 1962 off of a design by Architect Alan Greenwell. Originally born in Newcastle upon Tyne in England, Greenwell moved to BC in the late 1950s where he eventually served as an alderman on Prince George city council.
His firm, Greenwell & Bryan Architects, designed several notable buildings in Prince George including Prince George Secondary School, the Prince George Conference & Civic Centre and the HSBC Bank Tower. Greenwell died in 2021.
As he noted while delivering the commissions 2024 annual report to city council on March 10, Davison noted again at the March 13 meeting that since the register was established in 2007, only 15 buildings have been added to it.
He also noted that there are few houses in the city built during its earliest years post-incorporation in the 1910s and 1920s.
Also on the commission’s 2025 work plan is several tasks to update the heritage register and the nomination process.
That includes broadening the definition of heritage to allow for more places to be added to the register, engaging the public to solicit nomination for the register and updating the nomination form for the register.
Other aspects of the work plan include working on revitalizing the city’s heritage signs, which Davison talked to council about at length, community outreach efforts and partnerships with other groups and Lheidli T’enneh First Nation.
During the meeting, Davison was re-appointed by his colleagues as the commission’s chair for 2025 and Ayesha Rogers being appointed as vice-chair.
