Councillor Antoine-Hartley steps into heritage role in Leeds and Thousand Islands

There’s a certain poetry to it – a vacant chair on the Township of Leeds and the Thousand Islands’s heritage committee, and a councillor with a history degree quietly stepping forward to fill it.

At Monday’s township council meeting, Coun. Monique Antoine-Hartley answered the call to preserve the past, accepting an appointment to the municipal heritage committee.

The seat was left empty following the departure of former councillor Terry Jamison, one of two council representatives on the committee.

“Being a history major just kind of falls in there,” Antoine-Hartley said with a smile.

The committee, formed under a 2001 bylaw and guided by the Ontario Heritage Act, meets quarterly to advise council on the stewardship of TLTI’s historic properties, structures, and stories — the bones and breath of a township that’s older than Canada itself.

When nominations were invited from council, Antoine-Hartley’s was the only one that came forward.

Her volunteerism avoided the need for a vote and restored the committee to full strength, with six members of the public and now, again, two from council – Coun. Brock Gorrell is the other representative from the council table.

The next meeting of the municipal heritage committee takes place April 25.