What's Happening To Adam Lanza's House?

It's been two years since the Sandy Hook tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut, and the small bedroom community is still reeling from the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. On Wednesday night, Newtown Legislative Council officials voted to demolish shooter Adam Lanza's house, in an effort to restore calm and comfort to the torn community.

According to the Associated Press, Lanza's house, where he lived for years prior to the Sandy Hook attack, will be razed once winter is over. The large, two-story house was acquired by a bank last December and given to the town. There's nothing left inside, as authorities destroyed all the furniture, clothes, and possessions shortly after the deadly shooting. Once the house is razed, there are no further plans to build another residence on the two-acre property.

Newtown Legislative Council officials told the AP that the acres will remain open land. If the land is ever purchased or developed in the future, First Selectwoman Pat Llodra requested that "any proceeds...would be for the benefit of the victims." Llodra told NBC Connecticut:

The process bringing into the Board of Selectman was an outreach to the families of the victims and the neighbors of that house to determine their sentiments and what action would best honor particularly the families of the victims. The recommendation I’m bringing to you is for demolition of that house.

The demolition is not yet official, as the Board of Selectman still has to sign off on the proposal. According to NBC Connecticut, the proposal will most likely be taken up again at the next meeting.

Adam Lanza reportedly lived in the yellow house on Yogananda Street with his mother, Nancy, since 1998. Lanza fatally shot his mother while she lay in her bed on Dec. 14, 2012, before driving to nearby Sandy Hook Elementary School. There, he killed 20 students and six educators with an assault rifle, before killing himself with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was 20 years old.

A report released by the Connecticut Office of the Child Advocate in 2014 showed that Lanza suffered for years from an untreated mental illness. He blacked out the windows to his bedroom with black garbage bags, and eventually began refusing to leave the house, but despite signs of anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, and depression, he continued to have access to guns and ammunition.

A year after the shootings, Vice President Joe Biden announced in Newtown that there would be a $100 million federal boost to mental health funding as part of the Mental Health Parity Act.

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