Owners say possible heritage designation hurting home's resale value

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The city’s intention to grant a heritage designation for a stone house once owned by a Confederation poet is driving down its value, the current owners said Thursday.

Margie Howsam, Jean Roger and Dave Roger, the surviving children of Dr. J David Roger, an internist and radiologist who lived in the home for 65 years until his death last June, spoke to the city’s built-heritage subcommittee in opposition to a report recommending heritage status for the 175-year-old home.

The property at 21 Withrow Ave. is currently on the market for $2.6 million, but a letter stating the city was pursuing the heritage designation, information the owners shared with a prospective buyer, led that person to reduce their bid by more than $500,000.

In the meantime, the owners say they spend more than $3,500 per month on taxes, utilities and insurance for the vacant house.

“It is very disturbing that the city can make decisions on private property that then leaves the ensuing additional responsibilities and expenses to owners,” Jean Roger said.

The city began the heritage-designation process only after receiving several calls from neighbours, when the one-and-a-half storey home on a large, treed property was put on the market.

The real estate listing says there’s potential for 14 lots and calls it a “rare find within the Greenbelt.”

Heritage staff say the home has design value as a good example of a “vernacular 19th century stone house in the classical tradition” and historic value for its association with the early development of Nepean Township and Confederation poet William Wilfred Campbell.

He owned the property for three years and immortalized it in a 1916 poem published in the Ottawa Journal, in which he wrote, “When the woods at Kilmorie are scarlet and gold.”

Howsam noted the poet’s short occupancy of the home and said the staff report favouring designation was “romantically prejudicial” because the poet was the only person who ever called it “Kilmorie.”

She also said the house is not a landmark and doesn’t feature any fine architectural details or craftsmanship.

More than half a dozen residents and College Coun. Rick Chiarelli spoke in favour of the heritage designation, with many pushing the committee to expand it to the include the entire property.

City staff said they did consider the possible heritage value of the property, but ultimately decided to seek a designation for just the home’s exterior, which the committee endorsed.

Council will have the final say on May 11

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