HOPE, for a New Library

As mentioned elsewhere on this site, the parents of the Columbine victims joined together to address what would happen to the CHS library, where ten of our kids were murdered and many were injured and traumatized. We were upset that the school district planned on cleaning up the library and filling in the bullet holes.  We could not imagine asking students to return to that death chamber.  So, we formed a nonprofit group, Healing of People Everywhere (HOPE), to convince the school district to tear out the CHS library and replace it.

The district said it did not have the funds, nor could it justify, replacing the library.  So, HOPE insisted that IT would  raise the $3.1 million estimated to be needed to tear out the library, create an atrium in its place, and build a new library.

Thanks to the generosity of so many people, and the hard work of volunteers, we succeeded in just a few short months! A dedicated construction team managed to tear out the floor of the library and replace it with a beautiful atrium above the cafeteria in record time. Columbine High’s cafeteria was immediately below the library.  It is now is two stories high, not one, and students are treated to a beautiful ceiling with a huge mural and hanging “clouds.”

A new, beautiful library was constructed a year later. 

A few people suggested that the library should not have been removed, that its removal was somehow a victory for the two killers. Not so. The way that we and the community pulled together was clearly a victory over the hatred of the killers.