Duane Hicks
With town council once again looking at re-zoning the so-called “Nelson Street Park” for residential development, a group of local residents has gotten together to oppose the move and keep the lot zoned as “open space.”
The “Nelson Street Park” has been considered for re-zoning and residential development several times in the past, including in 1990, 2004, and 2008.
Each time, neighbourhood residents stood up and challenged it.
Kalan Kielczewski, who recently purchased a home in that part of town, is leading the campaign to stop the re-zoning this time around.
Kielczewski noted that in 2008, she was renting a house on Church Street and signed the petition to save the park. After learning about the proposed re-zoning again a couple of weeks ago, she decided to contact fellow resident Eric Rude, who had been instrumental in halting the development in the past, to see what could be done this time.
Kielczewski has distributed 17 petitions at various locations in town, and personally solicited signatures from more than 160 people so far, including her co-workers at Riverside Health Care Facilities, Inc.
She added local MP John Rafferty has lent his support, as well, and not only will be signing the petition but writing a letter to the town.
Kielczewski said her main reason for fighting the re-zoning of the lot is to keep a safe place for children to play.
While the town also is proposing to re-zone the property on the corner of Minnie Avenue and Front Street from tourist/commercial (C4) to “open space” to offset the eliminated open space that would result from the conversion of the “Nelson Street Park,” Kielczewski feels this is not a safe alternative.
“The idea of re-zoning the area next to the wood yard doesn’t exactly sit well with me,” said Kielczewski.
“I know that I am the mother of a six-year-old child and I wouldn’t feel comfortable sending my child to go play next to the wood yard, considering there is higher traffic, there’s pulp trucks in and out of there all hours of the day.”
Kielczewski admitted that writing a letter to the editor in the Fort Frances Times, collecting signatures, making phone calls, and getting up and speaking in front of council is outside her comfort zone, but “it needed to be done.”
“I am literally the new kid on the block,” she remarked. “I know some of my neighbours have been through this three times, and a couple of them had said, ‘The town, they’re starting to wear us down because this has been an ongoing fight.’
“Because I am the new kid on the block and this is the first time I’ve had to try and stop this, I guess I’ve got the energy and the drive. . . .
“The torch has kind of been passed on to me,” she reasoned.
“I am a parent now, so you look at things differently, and I definitely want to try and stop this if I can, just for the kids,” stressed Kielczewski, recalling when she was young, the Sixth Street School property was her backyard and she still has fond memories of playing outside there.
“It’s nice to see my daughter doing the same thing, especially since times have changed so much between the ’80s and now.
“We weren’t on the computer. We didn’t have a Wii or DS,” she noted. “We had Saturday morning cartoons—that was basically about it.
“Technology wasn’t as big then as it is now,” she added. “I think it’s important to keep the simple things in life, like open green spaces and parks, to allow kids to be kids.”
Kielczewski said that part of living in Northwestern Ontario is residents are supposed to have wide-open spaces and natural beauty to enjoy, especially for the children.
She added some people have asked her if the fight against the proposed re-zoning is about preserving some residents’ view of the river, but it’s really much more than that.
“Sure, of course, it’s nice to have the river view, but that’s not the angle everybody’s coming from,” Kielczewski vowed. “Not having the park for children is the number-one priority even though not all neighbourhood residents even have children.
“They want to see the park remain as it is now and for future generations.
“It’s always been there. You look around Fort Frances and think of all the things that used to be that no longer are,” remarked Kielczewski.
“It kind of saddens me to think every time I look out my back window, I say to myself, ‘Enjoy it while it lasts.’
“That’s just not right.”
Rude, who has been helping Kielczewski with her campaign, said Friday that he’s maintaining the stance he has in the past, and feels the town should look elsewhere for residential development.
“Why is there a need to generate income by the sale of properties?” he wondered. “Shouldn’t the town capitalize on its previous investments in properties?”
Rude questioned if re-zoning and selling five lots is really worth losing the green space when there is other town-owned property that could be sold.
For example, why would the town sell five lots from dividing up the Nelson Street Park when it could sell the old Huffman School property. And if not sell the latter, why did the town buy it in the first place?
Rude added Erin Crescent is another example of town-owned property that he felt possibly also could be developed.
Like Kielczewski, Rude said he feels the town saying it will re-zone property near the wood yard as a sort of trade-off for re-zoning the park is not a good idea, especially since the town is supposed to be a nationally-recognized “safe community.”
“Is that a safe place to have an open space for children?” he questioned, adding the area, located along a truck route, would have to be secured.
As well, this space is used for parking during the Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship (FFCBC), noted Rude, adding that re-zoning it makes no sense, especially if the FFCBC wants to return the event to the waterfront down the road.
Rude stressed that he is not “against progress,” but re-zoning the Nelson Street Park would change the neighbourhood in a way that would impact not only present residents, but future ones.
“I can’t live in this neighborhood forever, but other people might move in with children and they deserve a good place to live,” he reasoned.
“That’s where my drive comes from.”
Rude said that he’s heard arguments in the past that nobody uses the park, but disagrees.
“I didn’t know we had to take attendance? Do we take attendance at all the playgrounds?” he asked.
“The library has now taken over a baseball diamond. The east end park has ice equipment, that’s what it’s used for.
“There’s a playground over by Phair and Sixth—I don’t see any kids playing on that. Why don’t we sell that one?” added Rude rhetorically.
“A park—is that not an open, uninhibited play space?”
Rude suggested that perhaps the town or a service club or community group could add picnic tables, benches, or a red-canopied sun shelter, like the ones along the La Verendrye Parkway, at the Nelson Street Park to encourage the public to use it more.
But he added it does not need playground equipment to make it a park.
“Swings and sandboxes will only allow swinging and playing in sandboxes. But a field allows everything,” he noted.
