New primate will decide action after receiving report on lease approval process
London, Ont.
Hard questions flew at a special session of General Synod June 28 in which members asked whether the church could get out of its commitments to an $8.18-million, five-year lease for a new national office—the answer to which remains uncertain, General Synod’s chancellor said, pending the results of an investigation into how the lease was approved.
Canon (lay) Clare Burns, chancellor of General Synod, disclosed to the assembly June 24 that senior officers of the Anglican Church of Canada had hired the accounting firm Doane Grant Thornton to investigate the approval process for the lease to rent new national office space at 300 Bloor St. West in Toronto, to be shared with those of the United Church of Canada and Presbyterian Church in Canada. Rounding figures up, Burns pegged the size of the lease at $9 million, though estimates in the church’s 2024 financial statements tally to $8.18 million. On June 28, Burns, said it was not yet clear whether the lease would be “legally enforceable.”
Archdeacon Alan Perry, general secretary of General Synod, and treasurer and CFO Amal Attia signed the lease April 29, 2024. Prior to the latest meeting of General Synod, Perry took an unexplained leave of absence with no specified duration, effective June 3.
‘A massive wake-up call about our governance structures’
Burns said one of the goals of the investigation was to determine how senior church management apparently signed the lease without a report back to, or prior request for approval from, Council of General Synod (CoGS) about that specific contract. She called the church’s experience “a massive wake-up call about our governance structures.”
“Obviously this can never be allowed to happen again,” Burns said. “Part of the investigation is to identify the weaknesses in the system.” She noted that the “Pathways” report of the primate’s commission on re-imagining the church had proposed that officers of General Synod convene a constitutional convention, which would give the church an opportunity to reconsider its governance structures.
“I’m not speaking out of turn when I say that the senior officers in the church had many sleepless nights since we discovered this,” she said.
However, when Bishop of Saskatchewan Richard Reed expressed concern that the Anglican Church of Canada did not have enough money to afford the lease, Burns responded, “I want to assure General Synod the church is not insolvent.”
Burns said Doane Grant Thornton’s report on their investigation would “hopefully” be complete by the end of July. The report will go to the primate-elect, Bishop of Ottawa Shane Parker, who will then decide the church’s response.
In discussing the lease for 300 Bloor St. West, General Synod shifted into a committee of the whole—a special session for talking about complicated or controversial issues that uses the procedural rules of a committee but includes all members of General Synod. Members voted to move synod into the Committee of the Whole for a maximum of 40 minutes to allow questions and discussion of the lease, recognizing that not all questions asked could be answered.
Annual cost of lease could be four times higher than that of current office
General Synod currently owns property at 80 Hayden St. in Toronto, known as Church House, which includes its national office as well as those of Alongside Hope and the Anglican Foundation of Canada (AFC). Burns estimated that 80 Hayden St. costs the church about $425,000 annually, although recouped costs—including rent collected from Alongside Hope and the AFC—bring the net cost down to about $250,000.
Burns said it is her understanding that if General Synod moves to 300 Bloor St. West as originally envisioned, there will be no office space for Alongside Hope and the AFC—both of which have said they will leave 80 Hayden St. if General Synod leaves. She estimated the current cost of the 300 Bloor St. West lease, including base rent and additional rent, as between $960,000 and $1 million annually.
Karen Chapeskie, lay member for the diocese of the Yukon, expressed concern over this resulting increase in annual costs to the church, particularly after General Synod had voted on June 27 to allocate up to $2 million over the next triennium to pursue six pathways for change recommended by a primate’s commission.
“I wouldn’t be considering that as a wise investment if I’m in a financially restrained budgetary [situation] on my own home,” Chapeskie said. She questioned why, if the church was looking to transform itself for the future through the pathways, it would pay such an “exorbitant amount of funds” and saddle its youth with debt, lessening the amount of money available to them later on.
“Obviously you’re not the first person to say, ‘If this was my personal financial budget, this would be a problem,’” Burns said. “But I want to be clear: the lease is there. It’s done. Whether it’s legally enforceable or not is still an open question. But we’re past the point of having a conversation about, ‘Are we doing this or not?’ This document is signed and now we have to deal with the fact it’s signed and try to figure out what the right response is going forward.”
Bishop Annie Ittoshat, suffragan bishop of the diocese of the Arctic, highlighted not only how the lease approval process appeared to bypass proper avenues, but how the $8.18 million could have helped other areas of the church that lack funding and resources.
“I’m overseeing 15 communities in my area in Northern Quebec and we only have about four priests,” Ittoshat said. The amount of money spent on the lease, she said, “would come so far in my area.”
No acceptable offers received for Hayden Street property
On June 24, Burns told General Synod that a long-gestating plan for the Anglican Church of Canada to move into shared national office space with the United and Presbyterian churches—which the three denominations had been discussing for years with an eye to building ecumenical relationships and ideally cutting operating costs—was based on the intention of selling Church House and using the revenue to pay its lease at the new location.
A pre-pandemic assessment by investment firm Colliers estimated that General Synod could receive $15-$17 million in 2020 by selling its property at 80 Hayden Street. CoGS then approved giving the general secretary authority to sign a non-binding memorandum of understanding that would move forward the project to share new office space with the Presbyterian and United churches.
Burns said June 28 that the church had received a post-pandemic valuation of its current property at 80 Hayden St. While the property has been on the market for sale, she said, the church had not yet received an acceptable offer.
Helen Love, lay member for the diocese of Islands and Inlets, said she was “very disturbed” to hear about the situation. “It does not make, in my mind, financial sense to be selling a property to rent a property and then invest $4 million in fixing up that property to be able to store things like archives,” Love said. She also questioned whether the church needed its archives stored “in the highest-rent area of the country.”
The Rev. Iain Luke, of the diocese of Saskatoon, asked Burns to clarify whether the primate was canonically required to work out of Toronto, as opposed to merely wherever the national office happens to be. In response, Burns said, “I’m not up here to do a pop quiz on where the primate has to live, but I am confident, because this has been a topic of considerable discussion over the last year, that there is a requirement where Toronto is listed in the canon.”
In fact, the canon on the primacy states, “the Primate shall maintain an office at the headquarters of the General Synod of The Anglican Church of Canada,” but it does not mention Toronto specifically.
A significant element in the cost of the lease is an estimated $3.98 million for “leasehold improvements,” work needed to be done to turn the space into a working office. Burns, in response to question on these costs from Archdeacon Travis Enright of the diocese of Edmonton, said the church had retained a value engineer to review the project and advise its officers and CoGS as to what cost savings might be available in that work, and to assess what its options might be in relation to its Hayden Street property.
Gary Russell, lay member for the diocese of Rupert’s Land, also drew attention to the strict environmental conditions needed to hold physical archives. He asked whether there had been “a substantial investment in creating those proper conditions to safely hold our archives at the current location” of 80 Hayden Street, and whether moving the archives would require another major investment.
Burns confirmed that archives require special protection, with part of the costs due to structural arrangements needed to safely hold the weight of archival materials and documents. The General Synod Archives include baptismal certificates—an important identity document for many people in Canada—marriage documents and materials related to residential schools, she said. “We have a really big obligation to keep this stuff … To the extent we still have anything related to the residential schools, we obviously have an enormous moral obligation to safeguard that.”
Chancellor fields questions
General Synod asked the chancellor several questions related to the lease.
“Who made the decision to sell Hayden Street and rent at Bloor Street?” asked Verna Firth, lay member from the diocese of the Arctic. “The question of who signed the lease, and what authority they had, and who knew what when, is all the subject matter of the investigation that is currently being conducted by Doane Grant Thornton,” Burns said.
“Was there a meaningful tendered process or has this been a sole-source decision?” asked Robert Maguire, lay member for the diocese of Saskatoon. Burns said a well-known, nationally recognized developer had made contractual arrangements with Bloor Street United Church, landlord for 300 Bloor St. W, for the building project. She said it was her understanding there had not yet been a tendering for the leasehold improvements, but that she did not have the exact information to answer Maguire’s question.
Reed asked Burns to clarify Canon II of General Synod, which addresses the signing of contracts such as leases and the oversight role of the Financial Management Committee (FMC). Canon II, Part 2 authorizes and empowers the treasurer to affix the Anglican Church of Canada’s corporate seal to deeds and documents. On June 27, Burns told the Anglican Journal that Canon II “only permits the treasurer to sign contracts if they are approved by the relevant committee.” The previous day, FMC chair Canon Patricia Dorland told the Journal the committee was not asked to and did not review the lease before it was signed.
Based on Canon II, Part 2, Reed said, “Isn’t it true that this type of thing, especially something of this magnitude, should not have happened without a resolution passed at CoGS?” Burns replied, “That would be my reading of it, yes.”
The Rev. Stephanie Shepard, clergy member for the diocese of New Westminster, asked what the legal and relational challenges might be of trying to withdraw from the lease.
“If the lease is legally enforceable, there is only one method of getting out… and that would arise in circumstances where there’s sufficient delay in the construction that we would no longer be obligated to meet the terms of the lease,” Burns said.
“In terms of our challenges from a relationship perspective, we have three amazing denominations involved in this project,” the chancellor added. “We have a long and good history of friendship with the Presbyterians and the United Church… We don’t want to damage any of that.”
With Bloor Street United Church landlord of the Bloor St. property, the Rev. Grace Burson, clergy member for the diocese of Montreal, asked if the United Church of Canada was “open to reevaluating the whole situation for the benefit of all parties to try and find some way back from this catastrophe that doesn’t involve last-ditch legal solutions, but rather a relational solution based on our common goals.”
The chancellor responded by highlighting the presence of the Rev. Michael Blair, general secretary of the United Church of Canada and an invited guest of General Synod who had sat and listened to the assembly discuss the lease situation. “I’m personally very grateful for how gracious he is being and we will continue to have conversations with the United Church and the Presbyterian Church,” Burns said.
Maguire asked if General Synod had errors and omissions insurance, whether it applied to senior officers “who may or may not have executed legal contracts,” and what the limits of that errors and omissions insurance might be. “Whatever that number is, it’s probably inadequate given today’s circumstance and we may want to seriously consider purchasing additional errors and emissions insurance in the future,” Maguire said.
“It’s a great question,” Burns replied. “One of the things that we’re exploring is what insurance coverage we have and who might else be responsible in part for what has happened, and whether they’re insured.”
Archbishop David Edwards, bishop of Fredericton and metropolitan of the ecclesiastical province of Canada, asked what would happen at the end of the five-year lease. Burns said her current information was that there is an automatic renewal clause in the lease, which will renew the contract for another term unless General Synod gives notice to the landlord.
“If we give notice, then we’re on the hook for any difference between what they can sublease this space for and what we would otherwise be paying,” Burns said. “That is, as I understand it, part of the lease. But again, [whether] the lease [is] legally enforceable is not something that we have a clear picture on at the moment.”
AFC, Alongside Hope left out of new office
Laurie Bellay, lay member for the diocese of Rupert’s Land, asked why the church’s relationship to Alongside Hope and the AFC is “seemingly less important” than its relationship to the United and Presbyterian churches, given that there is no room for the former to have offices at 300 Bloor St. West, but room for the latter.
“It’s not anything that the Presbyterians or the United Church did in relation to Alongside Hope or the foundation,” Burns said. “That was us … Speaking for myself, that would never be the conclusion, or the relationship. I have no understanding of why it is that space was not allotted to those two organizations in the new plans. It’s one of the things that I hope we will find out in the investigation.”
However, AFC executive director Scott Brubacher—stressing that he was not speaking on behalf of Alongside Hope executive director Will Postma, but only his understanding from their relationship—said he only learned after the signing of the lease that there was no space in the new building for the AFC or Alongside Hope.
“Both organisations were given the opportunity to express interest in being part of the move to 300 Bloor St. [West], which we both did,” Brubacher said. “We expressed that interest and shared what amount of space would be required for our organisations. In our case [for the AFC], it was two workstations.
“I did not hear that there was no space for us until after the public announcement had gone that the lease had been signed. And I think it is important for synod to know how devastating that was for me personally and for our organization when that happened.”
In response, Burns said to Brubacher, “I think I could speak on behalf of synod and say we’re very, very sorry about that.”
Primate-elect offers assurance: ‘We will get through this’
Near the end of the discussion Parker, the primate-elect, rose and sought to assuage the concerns of General Synod. He noted that he would be contemplating his employment contract on Monday and added, “I’ll not be looking for escape clauses,” prompting some laughter from the floor.
Earlier in the discussion, National Bishop Susan Johnson of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC) had noted there was a point when the Anglican Church of Canada and ELCIC had contemplated moving their offices to Ottawa. Parker recalled that in 2010, as dean of Christ Church Cathedral, he was overseeing a massive redevelopment of properties around the cathedral at the time General Synod was weighing moving its offices into the building in Ottawa.
“For about 10 years of my life, as the dean of the cathedral leading into the time that I was bishop, I was involved in a major, major multimillion-dollar [deal in the] diocese involving vertical and horizontal leases, multiple partners, contractors, lawyers, developers—on it goes,” the primate-elect said.
“I’m not a saviour … I’ll do my best in two years, 10 months and 29 days,” Parker added, referring to the time until he turns 70, the mandatory retirement age for primates. “But this is not new to me fundamentally and I’m not queasy about this kind of stuff. We will get through this and we will end up on the other side of it much stronger, much more focused, much more disciplined as a church.”
Beatryce Hardock, lay youth member for the diocese of Calgary, approached the Anglican Journal after the discussion to encourage the church to “pray for a miracle” in removing the burden of the lease. But she also said God can use such moments to teach lessons.
“I believe God can work in the systems we have, and he can bring us an unexpected way out of this if it is his will,” Hardock said.
“This may be a wake-up call. If there’s no miracle to do with getting out of this sort of contract, that’s okay. But I think we still should give some prayer towards the Spirit and make some space for some miraculous work to happen.”
