HALIFAX — A historic building in the Halifax Public Gardens was damaged by a suspicious fire late Monday, marking the third time in less than a year that the beloved downtown park has been damaged while it was closed.
Halifax Regional Police issued a statement saying the fire outside the century-old Horticultural Hall was reported around 11 p.m.
Dave Meldrum, deputy chief with Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency, said firefighters used bolt cutters to get into the park after passersby spotted the flames from outside its iron gates.
"It was a relatively small fire and it was quickly extinguished and no one was found at the scene," Meldrum said in an interview. "Any time we get a fire on the outside of an unoccupied building, it raises questions."
The front of the clapboard building on Spring Garden Road was left a charred mess.
On July 27, 2022, a security guard discovered that strips of bark had been removed around the trunks of 30 trees, most of which were between 50 and 200 years old. The removal of bark in this way, known as girdling, is often fatal to trees.
Less than two months later, firefighters were dispatched to Horticultural Hall, where a corner of the building had been set on fire. The flames were quickly extinguished, but the fire damaged two windows and a section of the roof.
On Monday, police issued a statement asking anyone with information about or video recordings of the latest incident to call police or submit an anonymous tip to Crime Stoppers.
The six-hectare Victorian-style garden was officially opened in 1867.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 11, 2023.
The Canadian Press
