The former executive director of the Africville Heritage Trust is speaking out, a day after she was dismissed from the organization.

Carole Nixon says she doesn't know why she was let go, and the chair of the trust isn't commenting on the situation. Now Nixon says she is thinking about filing a human rights complaint.

"I'm considering it," Nixon tells CTV News. "I will be guided by the advice of my lawyer."

Nixon's dismissal came just one day after members of the black community in Halifax expressed their outrage over her hiring at a community meeting. Dozens attended the meeting and they voted unanimously that Nixon – a white woman and an Anglican priest – was not the right person for the job.

The trust released this statement late Wednesday afternoon.

"While in June 2011 the Trust felt that Carole Nixon would be the best person to fulfill the role as Executive Director of the Trust, that is no longer the case," said Daurene Lewis, chair of the Africville Heritage Trust Society.

"As of this morning, Ms. Nixon is no longer an employee of the Africville Heritage Trust. We will be initiating a search for a new Executive Director as soon as possible, and will be arranging for an interim manager until that search is complete."

According to the Human Rights Act employers cannot discriminate based on race, but it also states there can be exceptions to that rule.

"The Human Rights Act…realizes that there are times, for instance, when there's an ethnic organization and it wants to hire someone from within that community, the Human Rights Act actually acknowledges that sometimes that's necessary and that's the best for that organization," says Gerald Hashey of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission.

But the manager of investigation and compliance says the exception should apply to hiring practices, and should not be grounds for dismissal of someone that has already been hired by an organization.

Nixon was hired for the position in June and she started working for the trust in July. The controversy over her hiring sparked only recently, and she says she was surprised by people's reactions because she was told from the beginning that her race would not be an issue.

"They assured me, and I believed that the board meant that, that they were adamant that they were going to hire the best person for the job," she told CTV News early Wednesday.

As executive director of the trust, Nixon's main focus was to raise money for the construction of an interpretation centre that will be built close to the new Africville church. Lawyer Walter Thompson says the interpretation centre is a public facility that would be sustained by public funds, so he isn't convinced the exception would apply in this case.

"My big reservation about it is this is not a private facility, like a synagogue or a mosque or a church," says Thompson. "I certainly think she has an argument, particularly in the context of this being a retroactive decision."

Lewis maintains Nixon's dismissal has nothing to do with race. She won't say if Nixon was fired from the position, and will only comment that she is no longer employed with the trust. She also tells CTV News the dismissal isn't about just one issue.

Questions were raised earlier this week about Nixon's employment history. Some reports stated Nixon had resigned or had been fired from various associations over allegations of mismanagement and misuse of funds. But Nixon has denied these allegations.

"They were very concerning, and indeed it was something that needed to be investigated and have more information on," says Lewis.

Lewis won't say if that's why Nixon was let go from the trust, but when asked if she felt Nixon had misrepresented herself, Lewis said there may have been omissions.

But Nixon has her own theory about her sudden dismissal.

"There was a lot of heat in the kitchen over the race issue, and maybe they couldn't stand up to it any longer," Nixon tells CTV News. "Maybe this other stuff became a convenient way, or maybe they just panicked."

Nixon says she is still considering her options and she plans to seek legal advice before deciding on her next move.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Jacqueline Foster