TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (WTWO/WAWV)– The Vigo County Public Library took its next steps in bringing a branch building back to 12 Points on Wednesday, hosting a ceremonial “wall-breaking” with community members on hand.

The ceremony comes days after after Keymark Construction started renovations on the building, which used to be a funeral home. Executive director at the library Kristi Howe said it marks the next steps– after years of work to get to this point. 

 “It’s kind of our symbolic start to this project,” she said. “Symbolic in that we’ve really had work going on trying to make this library a reality for the last two years. Today, we can really celebrate with the community that we’re seeing progress.”

Howe said they’ve worked with community members in the area, and they want this building to offer different services than what’s currently available at the main branch.

“Books will just be a very small part of what we offer here, Howe said.” We’re not really looking to replicate the services we have at the main library. Instead, we’ll be customizing the services of this building to meet the needs of the community.”

She said the main focus is implementing more interactive spaces for children and their parents.

“We’ll have large children’s spaces and a lot of opportunity for kids and their parents and grandparents to really learn through play and be able to do a lot of interaction together,” Howe said. “Hands on things like a teaching kitchen, a tool library, things like that.”

The total cost of the project is $2.4 million. That includes interior and exterior work on the building, as well as work on a garage on the property.

Keymark Construction President Jacob Hellman detailed some of the work they’ve done to this point.

“We started doing the interior demolition about a week or two ago. It’s a full demolition and remodel of the old funeral home for the new library. We started, we filled out about five dumpsters worth of debris already,” he said.

Hellman said construction should finish by the end of the year. The library will open sometime in 2024.