As ground breaks on Oct. 1 memorial, community reminded that every voice counts

Editor's note: Este artículo está traducido al español. https://lasvegassun.com/news/2026/oct/01/lasvegassun.com/news/2026/oct/01/al-iniciarse-la-construccin-del-monumento-conmemor/ On Thursday, Oct. 1, 2026, at 2 a.m., Tennille Pereira, operations manager of the Forever One Memorial, was at the construction tract of the future Oct. 1 shooting memorial when she saw workers beginning to mark where specific elements would be placed. The most visible sign was a large painted ellipse indicating the eventual location of the Remembrance Ring. Pereira, who has devoted six years to seeing the memorial built, said the sight triggered a rush of emotions, chief among them an overwhelming, indescribable joy. “Through each the hardships and each the challenges, we inactive proceed to spot the assemblage travel unneurotic and enactment bully things, and it is hard sometimes not to get stuck successful the weeds and the challenges, but what I’ve recovered is that a mode ever comes forward,” Pereira said. The Vegas Strong Fund will hold a private ceremony on Friday to commemorate the start of construction on the permanent memorial. The date also marks nine years since a lone gunman fired from a suite at a Las Vegas Strip hotel, killing 58 people and wounding more than 800 others. The attack remains the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history. The memorial will be erected on the festival grounds, near the intersection of East Reno Avenue and Giles Street at the southern end of Las Vegas Boulevard. MGM Resorts International donated two acres for the site in 2021. Opening the memorial on the tenth anniversary, Oct. 1, 2027, has always been the goal, Pereira noted, prompting the Vegas Strong Fund to begin fundraising and solicit a construction team immediately. Designed to resemble an infinity symbol when viewed from above, the memorial will feature a community plaza, the Remembrance Ring equipped with 58 lights honoring each victim, a tall, colorful sculpture called the Tower of Light, and ample seating and greenery. During the initial construction phase, crews will install Remembrance Walk pavers, parking areas, walking paths, benches, walls, preliminary landscaping, and the Remembrance Ring. The Tower of Light and other components will be finished in a second phase. The project has been years in the making. In 2019, the Clark County Commission approved the formation of a committee to plan a lasting memorial for the victims, survivors, first responders and others affected by the shooting. Members of the October Memorial Committee consulted with other communities that had experienced mass shootings and studied how memorials for different tragedies were developed. That effort produced months of public meetings, community surveys and discussions to ensure the Route 91 Harvest community was represented throughout the process. In September 2023, the commissioners endorsed the Forever One Memorial design submitted by JCJ Architecture. The proposal included a community plaza for events, an Angel Wall bearing the victims’ names and a sphere with 58 light towers reaching toward the sky. “Following the tragic events of October 1, 2017, Clark County has worked in concern with those astir impacted to found a imperishable memorial for the families of those mislaid and the survivors from that nighttime that resonates with a assemblage which has changed implicit the years,” Clark County Commissioner Jim Gibson said in a statement. “Through meaningful conversations and thoughtful consideration, we person reached the constituent of breaking crushed and opening construction. As 1 of the largest fiscal supporters of the memorial, the region feels a beardown consciousness of work to spot the memorial completed truthful it tin service as a respite for those successful request of its comfort.” Pereira acknowledged that the undertaking has been challenging, partly because many people were unaware of the effort. The Vegas Strong Fund and volunteers from the Route 91 Harvest community have been tabling at local events and hosting neighborhood meetings to explain the memorial’s significance, share updates and collect donations. Pereira said the memorial “really honors the mode the assemblage came unneurotic and celebrates our spot and our resilience and the astonishing things that person travel retired of it since the incidental happened successful 2017.” The Vegas Strong Fund has raised more than $22 million in donations, Pereira said, but still needs $7 million to cover the final phase, which includes the Tower of Light. Clark County allocated $10 million for the memorial in a unanimous vote in January; the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority contributed $5 million; MGM Resorts International pledged an additional $5 million beyond the land donation; the Vegas Golden Knights Foundation gave $1 million; and more than $1 million has come from individual contributions and paver sales. All funds are directed toward construction. “We archer everybody (that) each spot counts, just like each dependable counts, and everyone connected Oct. 2 and their efforts counted. It’s astir what you person to springiness to the community,” Pereira said. Donations can be made online at http://foreveronememorial.org/support.