COACHELLA – Overcoming hate attack on the local mosque, Californian people of the Coachella Valley have donated thousands of dollars to repair the house of worship before Ramadan.

“We had to do a few things with city before we could begin construction,” Reymundo Nour, the imam of the Islamic Society of the Coachella Valley, told CBS Local 2 on Tuesday, May 10.

Last December, somebody driving by opened fire at the worshiping house at 84650 Ave. 49 in Coachella. No one was injured in the attack.

Despite the growing hate attacks, the mosque has recently bought the vacant lot next door to build it as a mosque and a community center.

The new construction will include classrooms, a social hall, and enough room to fit twice as many worshipers as its current space.

Along with expanding space, the mosque officials planned several events to reach out to their neighbors.

Kicking off repair works, the outside of the mosque is still blackened and boarded up, but inside there are new walls being built and there will soon be new carpet and tile to replace the damage.

“We’ve made some tremendous progress compared to where we were the last time. Today we are putting the pieces back together,” said Nour.

The repair of the mosque was not possible without the donation of $34,000 which was collected from people from across the southland.

The goal is to have the mosque ready to welcome members and visitors in time for Ramadan next month.

“We have more families coming, more participation and so we’re hoping everything is done. It’s always an exciting time,” Nour said.

“What we’re doing here is getting this back to usable condition and then we’ll focus on building the new mosque.”

Though the Muslim officials forgave the attacker, the judge sentenced 23-year-old Carl Dial to six years in prison for arson and a hate crime.

“We issued forgiveness for the young man, but we let the justice system do what it does best,” said Nour.