Is the former Almaguin Highlands Secondary School in Strong Township about to be demolished?
That’s the speculation after someone took a picture of an excavator sitting outside the former school building in mid-September and posted it on the What’s Up Sundridge Facebook group page.
Brian Dumas, Strong's chief building official confirms that a demolition permit was issued.
Although a demolition permit has been issued, as of the final weekend of September, the excavator doesn’t appear to have moved and no work on taking down any part of the building appears to have started.
The building sits on 43 acres of land and was built in the late 1950s. Originally known as Sundridge-South River Secondary School, it was built to replace the two local high schools in Sundridge and South River.
During the early 1960s, the school was expanded to accommodate students from Burk’s Falls and Powassan, paving the way for the high schools in both communities to close. The school then became known as Almaguin Highlands Secondary School and included students from Magnetawan to Novar and areas in between.
The former AHSS was replaced by a more modern building in 2011.
See: Almaguin Highlands Secondary School now open for business
With the old high school now sitting empty, the Near North District School Board sold it on June 25, 2014 for $5,001 to a numbered company known as 2424055 Ontario Ltd.
Four years later, on July 30, 2018, 2424055 Ontario Ltd sold the site for $75,000 to another numbered company, this one listed as 1667271 Ontario Ltd.
According to the Ministry of Public Business and Service Delivery, ownership of the building and land remains under 1667271 Ontario Ltd, whose president is from Maple, Ont.
Dumas did not respond to further questions over who applied for the demolition permit, or when it was issued, when the demolition had to be completed and how the rubble would be disposed of.
Rocco Frangione is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter with Almaguin News. The Local Journalism Initiative is funded by the Government of Canada.
