Originally known as Lucas Settlement, Lucasville is located along Lucasville Road within the Halifax Regional Municipality. While some community members trace their presence even earlier, the historic African Nova Scotian (ANS) community of Lucasville was formally established in 1827, when land deeds were granted to James Lucas and Moses Oliver. Today, many descendants of these original settlers continue to live in the community. Key foundations of the community include the Lucasville Baptist Church (est. 1839) and the Wallace Lucas Community Centre, formerly the Wallace Lucas School (built in 1958).

Since 1827, Lucasville has persevered through numerous challenges including decades of land acquisitions by external interests, shrinking of the community, lack of access to adequate services, limitations on historic settlement development patterns, and regulations that permit development in a form, scale, and density not envisioned by the Lucasville ANS Community. This has resulted in an overall decrease of opportunities to prosper and realize desired community outcomes.

Members of Lucasville’s African Nova Scotian community have expressed that current planning policies are inequitable and do not support their vision for the community. Further, Lucasville lacks key services, amenities, and processes that demonstrate the municipality's recognition of this historic community and its contribution to the region. For these reasons, the ANS community of Lucasville has indicated a desire to go through the comprehensive Plan Review and Action Plan processes.

On September 10, 2024, Regional Council has approved municipal employees and community to begin a Planning Strategy Review and develop a Community Action Plan for Lucasville, as part of African Nova Scotian Community Action Planning. The required public engagement strategy for the review was approved on May 26, 2026.

African Nova Scotian Community Action Planning is a municipal process to understand community needs and priorities and identify actions for Council to consider. There are two parts to this process:

• A Plan Review involves reviewing the land-use regulations and policies for Lucasville and updating them to better align with community’s vision. The planning documents guide and regulate what and how development can happen in the area.

• The Action Plan lays out community goals that go beyond changes to planning documents or processes. It may include, but is not limited to, improvements to infrastructure and municipal services.

The project includes seven phases, from public engagement through to an adopted Community Action Plan and updated planning documents.

• To gather detailed feedback across a wide range of topics, focused engagement with interest groups will take place across a series of topic areas:
  • assets (community assets & natural environment);
  • live (housing & neighbourhoods);
  • work (employment & economic development);
  • play (parks, recreation & community facilities) and
  • thrive (infrastructure, services & implementation)

Engagement will include various tools and activities for providing input and feedback such as a municipal web page, surveys, open house meetings, and workshops. Members of Lucasville’s historic African Nova Scotian community and the general public will be notified of upcoming engagement opportunities as dates are confirmed.

Your input matters. What you share will help shape planning and actions that reflect Lucasville’s history, culture, and long-term goals. At the end of all engagement, municipal employees will summarize all feedback in a What We Heard report. It will include actions that are recommended, actions that are not recommended, and the reasons for these recommendations. The report will be shared with Regional Council as part of the approval process in Phase 7. Regional Council will make the final decision on what changes are implemented.