Preliminary assessment concludes that Hartrick House meets the threshold for heritage designation

Dear Friends, Supporters, and Fellow Advocates,

First and foremost, thank you.

Every signature on this petition, every share, every donation to our GoFundMe, and every conversation you have had with a neighbour, a friend, or a family member about Hartrick House has brought us to this moment. This update is for you, and it is an important one.

When it became clear that the Town of Ajax had no intention of commissioning an independent heritage evaluation before proceeding with demolition, our community made a decision: if the Town won't do it, we will.

We launched a GoFundMe campaign and you showed up.

Neighbours, supporters, and people who believed in what was right came together and donated their hard-earned money so that Hartrick House could receive the evaluation the Town chose not to give it. Every dollar raised was a vote of confidence not just in this house, but in the principle that heritage belongs to all of us.

We are deeply grateful for every single contribution. Despite all of your generous contribution, we did not raise enough to fund a full Cultural Heritage Evaluation Report (CHER).

Faced with that reality, we made the most of what we had. With the funds available, we commissioned a preliminary heritage evaluation, a meaningful and legitimate first step, conducted by a qualified heritage professional, even if not the full assessment we had hoped for.

The evaluation had to be conducted entirely from the outside, without the benefit of a full interior inspection.

Despite all the constraints, the preliminary evaluation (CHER) concludes that Hartrick House meets the threshold for heritage designation under Ontario Regulation 9/06 of the Ontario Heritage Act.

A community that could not raise enough for a full evaluation, with no access to the interior, and received no cooperation or support from the Town, still produced expert findings confirming that Hartrick House deserves heritage protection.

The Town of Ajax had every resource available to it. It chose not to look.

We had limited resources, an incomplete budget, and no access to the inside. We looked anyway.

This is an independent, professional expert conclusion reached under the most constrained of circumstances that Hartrick House has the cultural heritage value to be formally protected under Ontario law.

Now that we know this, the question that must be asked of Ajax Council is simple and direct:

Will the Town of Ajax proceed with demolishing a building that an independent expert has confirmed meets the heritage designation threshold, a finding reached without even seeing inside?
Imagine what a full evaluation, with proper funding and interior access, would reveal.

Since this petition launched, our community has:

• Launched a GoFundMe and thanks to your generosity, raised the funds needed for a preliminary heritage evaluation
• Commissioned and received a preliminary heritage evaluation that meets the designation threshold conducted without interior access and under significant resource constraints
• Engaged our local MPP Rob Cerjanec
• Met with MPP Rob Cerjanec in person, alongside a community delegation, to make our case directly
• Written to the Ontario Heritage Trust who acknowledged our situation and directed us to the Ministry level
• Written to the Minister of Citizenship and Multiculturalism MP Graham McGregor requesting consideration of designation under Section 34.5 of the Ontario Heritage Act, a provision that has never been used but exists for exactly these kinds of circumstances. 
• Organized a public protest in front of Ajax City Hall on August 7th, your voices were loud, visible, and impossible to ignore
• Requested a Special Council Meeting to formally reconsider Hartrick House demolition and request a CHER only to have it fail to meet quorum. Despite the significance of the House and the urgency of the situation, Mayor Shaun Collier, Ward 3 Local Councillor Lisa Bower, and Ward 3 Regional Councillor Joanne Dies chose not to vote for a special council meeting. A meeting cannot proceed without quorum, and their absence ensured it could not. The community showed up. They did not.

We have knocked on every door available to us. We are still knocking.

The window is narrow and the stakes are irreversible. Once Hartrick House is gone, it is gone forever. Here is how you can help right now:

📢 Share this update, post it, send it, talk about it. Public awareness remains our most powerful tool
✍️ If you haven't signed, please sign and ask one person today to do the same
💛 Write to Local MPP Rob Cerjanec - with an earnest request to talk with his provincial and federal counterparts to influence this decision
📬 Write to Ajax Council directly — let them know the community is watching and that this evaluation result demands a response
📣 Write to Minister of Multiculturalism and Citizenship - with a respectful and earnest request to consider designating Hartrick House under Section 34.5 of the Ontario Heritage Act.

Hartrick House has stood since 1852. It watched this town grow from farmland to the community we call home today. It predates Confederation. It has seen generations come and go. It has been recognized through Doors Open Ontario as a place worth visiting and remembering.

It deserves, at the very minimum, a fair and complete evaluation before a decision is made that cannot be undone.

We are ordinary neighbours who believed that doing the right thing matters even when it is hard, even when the funds run short, and even when the odds feel long. Your support has carried us further than we ever imagined.

Let's carry it the rest of the way together.

With gratitude and determination,

Zain A

On behalf of the Save the Hartrick House Community Group