WHAT IS THE SHARING OUR STORIES PROJECT?

Our culture and heritage includes many different components and perspectives that make this region unique. The municipality supports culture and heritage in many ways including festivals, public art, heritage buildings, natural landscapes, archives, and museums just to name a few. The 2014 Regional Plan identified the need to create a plan to assist the municipality in clarifying its vision, principles and priorities to more effectively guide investments and decisions related to culture and heritage. Also known as the Culture and Heritage Priorities Plan (CHPP), the Sharing Our Stories project will clarify the municipality's role in supporting culture and heritage by:

Analyzing the municipality’s current support for culture and heritage by reviewing existing programs, policies and complete best practices research
Completing targeted stakeholder and rights holder engagement, youth engagement, and provide opportunities for broader public input.
Developing and prioritizing a set of actions with timelines to improve how the municipality supports culture and heritage.

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Draft Vision and Principles

The final phase of the Sharing Our Stories project is underway and is targeting completion in summer 2019. The following highlights the draft vision and principles that are guiding the Plan’s development:

Culture is about sharing our stories.
Culture communicates our unique experiences and identities in Halifax Regional Municipality. It’s about people; the places where we gather, traditions we pass on, things we create, music we play, buildings we preserve, food we eat, and much more. This plan is about supporting culture and heritage by creating a set of priorities to improve and direct our investments, programs, policies, and partnerships. Core principles to the actions and priorities proposed in this plan are:

Belonging - Everyone is welcome. We will reflect and create opportunities to celebrate the diversity of identities, cultures and heritages in the region.

Adaptability - Culture is constantly changing. We will create new ways to support culture that are responsive to opportunities and changes.

Stewardship - Culture has value. We will support the celebration and preservation of the stories, objects, buildings, and places that are valued by municipal residents.

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What is Culture and Heritage?

Culture is about sharing our stories. It’s about people; the places we gather, the times we celebrate, the memories we share, the buildings we preserve, the objects we create, the music we play, the food we eat, and much more. Culture communicates our unique histories and celebrates the diversity of identities in the Halifax Regional Municipality. Heritage is a component of culture—it’s our cultural memory. Below are examples of culture:
A STORY SHARED—over a pizza baked in the community oven in the Dartmouth common.
A LANDMARK—meeting a friend at the Public Gardens.
A CELEBRATION—listening to traditional music at L’Acadie de Chezzetcook.
A FUTURE EXPRESSION—supporting NSCAD grads as they pursue new media.
AN ANNUAL TRADITION—gathering for fireworks on New Year’s eve.

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How does the Halifax Regional Municipality support Culture and Heritage?

Nearly every department of Halifax Regional Municipality is involved in supporting culture—from the Archives, to Planning & Development, to events. While there are many services and opportunities, we don’t have co-ordinated priorities on how to share resources.

Here are some examples of how the municipality supports local culture and heritage:

The professional arts grants program funds 38 artists, organizations and projects per year, such as Zuppa Theatre Co. project called “This is Nowhere.
The Halifax Regional Municipality is the first municipal government to create a Gord Downie & Channie Wenjack fund Legacy Space in City Hall.
You can borrow from our collection of over 150 musical instruments using your library card—just like you borrow books.
We've named our newest ferries after Nova Scotia civil rights activist Viola Desmond and Rita Joe, a Mi’kmaw artist, songwriter and craftswoman from Eskasoni First Nation in Cape Breton.
The municipality acts as a steward of the Shubenacadie Canal Cultural Landscape by protecting the area as parkland.
Memory keepers, the Municipal Archives houses images, words, artifacts and objects that tell our civic history. The municipality supports many community museums in telling our stories.
Barrington Street Revitalization project: $3.9 million budgeted in tax incentives and grant programs to revitalize the street.
Staff time, equipment and resources like transit are donated in support of Nocturne: Art at Night, bringing art and wonder to the streets of Halifax and Dartmouth.
The municipality provides a grant to the Middle Musquodoboit Agricultural Society to host the annual Halifax County Exhibition. This traditional country fair has been in existence since 1884 and continues to attract visitors to its livestock competitions, displays, and local vendors.