AURORA | The day after the Aurora theater shootings, well wishers started flocking to South Sable Boulevard and Centrepoint Drive.
The empty field across the street from the Century Aurora 16 theater where 12 were killed and 58 injured became an impromptu memorial, dotted with flowers, cards, stuffed animals and other items dedicated to the victims.
Michael Sheldon, the developer who owns the plot of land where the memorial cropped up, said that while the current memorial is temporary, it won’t be changing anytime soon.
“The temporary memorial will stay as long as it’s needed,” Sheldon said last week.
But what about a permanent memorial to replace it? And what about the theater itself, which has been closed and fenced off since the July 20 shootings?
City officials are beginning to tackle those questions, those who have dealt with the aftermath of similar melees say that process will be a lengthy one.
Last week, Aurora officials launched an online survey asking what should be done with the theater. Lori MacKenzie, a spokeswoman for the city of Aurora, said officials won’t count the surveys or look at the responses until the survey closes Aug. 31.
But based on other responses — be it over social media, newspaper comment threads or conversations around town — ideas for the future of the theater and memorial are varied.
Some have called for the theater to be remodeled, with theater No. 9, where the shootings occurred, serving as a memorial for the victims.
Others have said the theater should be razed.
Mike White, Sr. was in theater No. 9 the night of the shootings with several of his family members. His son, Mike White, Jr., was shot, as was his son’s girlfriend. Both survived.
White said that in the days after the shootings, he thought the best bet was to knock down the building, wiping away the visible reminder of the horror that happened there.
His stance on that has softened, he said, but he still isn’t keen on turning the theater into a type of shrine for the victims.
“I wouldn’t want to go to a memorial there,” he said.
White said he would rather see a park or something permanent to memorialize the victims outside the theater, possibly where the current memorial sits.
“I think that would be one of the best things,” he said.
Aurora City Councilwoman Marsha Berzins, whose ward includes the theater, said she would like to see the theater torn down or substantially renovated.
“I don’t think it would be appropriate for them to just go in and fix it and open it,” she said.
Berzins said she hasn’t heard many residents in her ward voice an opinion about the future of the theater, but the few who have stressed that if the theater is demolished, it needs to be replaced.
“We do need that in the area, we do need a theater somewhere in that area,” she said.
It’s not clear what the theater’s owners want. Cinemark, the Plano, Texas-based company that operates the theater, has been mum on the topic for more than a month. A spokesman for Cinemark did not return calls for comment.
According to Arapahoe County property records, the 14-year-old building at 14300 E. Alameda Ave. is worth a little more than $1 million. Property records list the owner as Simon Debartolo Group, Inc., a retail property group affiliated with Simon Malls, which owns the adjacent Town Center at Aurora Mall. Les Morris, a spokesman for Simon, did not return calls or emails this week.
After the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, the school’s library, where the bulk of the shootings occurred, was overhauled, but the school itself still stands. A memorial was erected in nearby Clement Park several years later.
Alam Cram, a physics professor at Columbine who helped plan that memorial, said the 11-year process of designing and building the $1.5 million permanent memorial at Clement Park was a “very long, and laborious process.
“(The memorial’s) purpose is to provide a place to reflect, gather your thoughts about your life and yourself,” he said. “In the end, the long process was worth it.”
In Nickel Mines, Pa., where five students were killed and five others wounded inside an Amish schoolhouse in 2006, officials bulldozed the schoolhouse.
At Virginia Tech, Larry Hincker, associate vice president for university relations, said there were calls to knock down Norris Hall, the academic building where most of the 32 victims killed in the 2007 massacre were shot.
But, Hincker said, the four-story building that housed several classrooms was an important one for the campus, and destroying it and replacing it would have cost about $40 million.
“People realized you really can’t do that, there are other ways to honor the memory of people and deal with those fears and concerns,” he said.
Instead, Hincker said officials opted to remodel much of the building. Areas where the shootings occurred are now home to the Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention.
Each incident is different, Hincker said, and figuring out the appropriate way to memorialize the victims and still move forward is a unique challenge in each case.
“Oftentimes, you go from the gut,” he said.
The city formed the 7/20 Relief Committee this month to look at several issues surrounding the shooting, particularly how the money donated to the victims will be doled out. Rich Audsley, a special adviser to the committee who helped in the aftermath of Columbine and Virginia Tech, said officials are focused now on disbursing relief fund money to the victims, but they will likely discuss the memorial in the future.
Sheldon, who owns the property, said it will be developed down the line, but he has no problem making sure that development encompasses some type of memorial for the victims.
I personally would like to see the theater gone for ever! A memorial built for the victims… Water flowing on the wall with names and a photo of each victim on the wall. I don’t think the theater should b reopened or rebuilt!
If you tear down the theater & don’t build another theater in its place. It shows that Holmes has won & opens the door for other psychos to do what they want & I don’t think the 12 victims of 7/20 would approve of that.