Repurposing Canada’s religious buildings

As church congregations dwindle across Canada and the cost to maintain their faith-built spaces increases, ideas abound for how to repurpose these buildings into potential sites for community amenities and affordable housing.

Nearly one-third of the country’s 27,000 religious buildings could close within the next decade, according to a 2019 study by National Trust for Canada. A new report documents the consequences of this loss and showcases the civic and community value these buildings hold.

In the Canadian Urban Institute’s (CUI), “Sacred Spaces, Civic Value: Making the Case for the Future of Faith-Built Assets,” the scope of data primarily extends to Christian-affiliated properties that are experiencing the highest decline in attendance.

Many of these aging assets, which are situated along main streets and in downtown areas, are key targets for redevelopment. Although they have long provided a range of programs and activities with a non-religious nature, they face ongoing financial struggles.

“The barriers to adaptation of faith-based assets are many, but the alternative – a loss of thousands of buildings, tens of thousands of square feet of community space, and hundreds of thousands of hours of community-focused programming – makes it an urgent problem worth solving,” the report states.

CUI reframes these assets as a form of “resilience infrastructure.” As cultural organizations and service providers search for affordable spaces to work from, there exists an opportunity for new partnerships, financial models, and civic purpose.

“Ownership of any problem is shared across sectors and jurisdictions, and finding courageous first-movers to try new approaches and inform useful models is difficult,” Mary W Rowe, CUI president and CEO, explained. “As federal, provincial, and local governments establish investment priorities for community strengthening, there is a prime opportunity to demonstrate the critical role that these civic assets play.”

Obstacles and Financial Constraints 

Higher utility costs and insurance premiums, years of funding shortfalls, and fewer skilled trades in historic craftsmanship are just a few financial constraints. Add to that more interest in online worship post pandemic and a declining pool of donors to heighten the case for adaptive reuse.

Many of these properties are, therefore, at risk of being redeveloped solely for private uses, leading to a lost network of social purpose space. According to CUI, “decades of tax abatements confirm these assets are in fact jointly owned by the public, who should have a stake in their futures.”

“Nonprofits and charities depend on churches for affordable space,” said Reverend Graham Singh, CEO, Relèven, Montréal, Quebec. “If we do nothing, the real estate market will turn them into condos. The real question is: how can we better understand community needs, and use their social impact to build new structures for change?”

Challenges are embedded into current policies and regulations. For instance, in zoning bylaws, “places of worship” are identified as institutional use. This limits creative and flexible uses, co-location, and development opportunities without lengthy, costly, or risky policy changes. As well, CUI reports that faith communities are rarely involved in creating municipal plans and strategies, so they lack knowledge of the process or informing the outcomes.

The report lays out a set of actions to adapt these spaces for the wider community while continuing to serve its congregations.

Actions for Reinvigorating Churches For Civic Use

1. The social impact

One priority is to quantify the social impact of properties and closure trends, and track potential for adaptive reuse. Actions involve creating a publicly accessible national inventory dataset of faith properties, including their location, type, and ownership status, as well as measuring the social impact of faith-built assets through socioeconomic and demographic analysis.

2. Co-design transformation

To reimagine the role of faith-built assets as multi-purpose community hubs and shift how the public perceives their role in evolving neighbourhoods, the potential to accommodate various uses must be considered, from climate resilience centres and supportive housing to commercial kitchens and pop-up markets.

For instance, in Sherbrooke, Quebec, the Église Christ-Roi, a Gothic Revival style church with vaulted ceilings, has been transformed into a climbing gym by Vertige Escalade.

Partnering with trade schools and professional trades associations is also key. Heritage faith buildings can be used as laboratories and apprenticeship opportunities to teach historic restoration and upgrades.

Another action is to co-design with impacted Indigenous communities, such as creating dedicated space for Indigenous-led cultural, spiritual, and economic uses. Compliance with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action and duty to consult Indigenous communities will identify tangible initiatives to incorporate reparation, to advance reconciliation.

CUI also suggests people identify strategic opportunity sites to direct investment for maximum civic benefit, such as faith properties located near a major transit station. There also needs to be better collaboration between municipalities and faith-based organizations who can work together on co-design planning policies, land use plans, zoning by-laws, strategies, community service programming, and to leverage available assets for municipal strategic objectives.

3. Build enabling frameworks

There needs to be a strong network of partners and resources that support faith-built asset adaptation across Canada.

Some actions to achieve this feat include: building a national network to support knowledge mobilization, multi-sectoral partnerships, and coalition building; publishing a guidebook that lays out a roadmap for identifying and securing funding sources and navigating faith property adaptation; amending municipal land use policies and zoning by-laws to permit such things as site intensification and additional residential, commercial, institutional uses, as well as co-location of non-institutional uses

Other actions propose exploring land title transfers and leases for public goods activation and implementing municipal policy area or zoning overlays to allow for density bonusing, and transfer of development rights.

4. Securing resources

The final priority extends to the challenges of funding building maintenance and the solution to attain alternative revenue sources through redevelopment.

“Building the capacity to pursue adaptation requires significant up-front funding, which presents the greatest hurdle to transforming faith-built assets,” the report lays out. “Adaptation requires major feasibility studies involving assessment of properties, buildings, and space; multi-sectoral consultation and engagement;
and servicing and impact studies. This all requires funding to recruit expertise and build capacity to navigate pre-development, planning and approvals, construction, and property management.”

Actions within this priority see adaptation as financially sustainable and include identifying funding opportunities, adopting portfolio management approaches for conducting faith-built asset inventory analyses, introducing new uses to generate alternative revenue for upgrades, leveraging joint venture partnerships to consolidate expertise and share risk, and using social purpose governance and financing options such as community land trusts and community bonds.

Emerging climate tools such as greenhouse gas emissions calculators and public energy efficiency programs can help keep faith buildings out of landfills.

Projects Target Successful Adaptation

There are many successful adaptations across North America that can inspire future projects.

West Broadway Commons in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is a 12-storey, mixed-market housing development that took the place of the All Saints Anglican Church’s parish hall, which was in dire shape and too expensive to rehabilitate. It now features common areas and 110 residential units: 56 affordable and the rest a mix of market-rate and premium units, 23 of which are barrier-free. Commercial spaces are integrated at ground level, with the majority leased by the Canadian Mental Health Association for their youth hub. A second space is intended for a local café, restaurant, or shop.

Initial funding came from an architect who helped the church secure $10,000 in CMHC Seed Funding for organizations involved in the initial phases of creating an affordable housing project. All Saints was able to access expertise and launch a request for proposal process to attract a social impact-focused development partner who could enter the joint-venture.

The generated revenue from commercial and residential rents has allowed the congregation to continue operating. Ownership of the building is split 51-49 with the majority stake under All Saints.

A project currently in development in Victoria, B.C., is a master-planning initiative to redevelop the site of Christ Church Cathedral, which involves three historic structures: the Cathedral itself, the Memorial Hall housing the Christ Church Cathedral School, and Yarrow Chapel.

Cathedral Commons, as the site is being called, will introduce new residential and commercial uses and amenities. Recent structural assessments estimated that necessary repairs and seismic upgrades to heritage buildings on the property may cost up to $50 million. The proposed development intends to generate revenue to fund a phased heritage revitalization and other amenities.

Brendon Neilson, executive director of the Diocese, described a shift in his diocese’s thinking. “Departing from the past when property decisions were considered strictly case-by-case and independent of each other, the Diocese recently conducted a feasibility analysis of every property within its portfolio,” CUI explained. “Strategic sites were identified for the Diocese to develop, partner on, or use differently. Cathedral Commons is one site in a potential 15-year project pipeline.”

These are just two promising examples of faith adaptation. To support a future where more developments are possible, CUI urges governments to scrap outdated rules, stating, “the necessary regulatory changes to land use and lending will enable the transformation of faith-based assets in line with socioeconomic objectives. As well, quantifying the social impact of these properties will reveal opportunities to reinvent them for a greater social good.

Communities and their municipal governments are being urged to “get ahead of the transitions faith-built assets are experiencing.”

“They need to support (and not impede) new forms of stewardship and development, and ensure that crucial civic uses, such as affordable housing, small business incubators, and creative and collaborative spaces, are central to the future use of properties that have served and benefited from communities for generations,” CUI concludes. “Such initiatives can be supported by all orders of government: municipal, regional, provincial, and federal.”

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