CANTON, N.C. (WLOS) — For Caroline Ponton, the former director of the Canton Area Historical Museum, the building next door was never just the town hall. It was where people gathered; where decisions were made; where a small mountain town felt like family.

“It was what I call a big family,” Ponton said. “That’s where people would come together and hash it out.”

Now, that building, once home to both Canton’s town hall and police department, is at the center of a costly rebuild after years of flood damage.

Town leaders say bids for the project came in higher than expected, pushing the total cost of rebuilding the town hall, police department and armory to nearly $11 million. The police department alone is expected to cost more than $4.7 million, while town hall renovations are estimated at $2 million.

For Ponton, the numbers tell only part of the story. She remembers the day Tropical Storm Fred swept through Canton, filling streets and buildings with water.

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“When my husband came to pick me up, he had to help me into the car because there was water,” she said. “The whole time, I’m praying.”

At the museum next door, volunteers rushed to save what they could, pulling artifacts outside as floodwaters rose and mold threatened to destroy decades of history.

The damage wasn’t new. Ponton said Canton has faced repeated flooding for generations, from historic storms in the 1940s to back-to-back floods in 2004.

“You don’t know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been,” she said.

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Even after lessons learned and changes made, the town was hit again, first by Fred, then by Hurricane Helene, testing both infrastructure and resilience.

Despite that history, Ponton said what stands out most is how people responded. She recalls town workers, volunteers and neighbors working side by side in the aftermath, hauling debris, salvaging what remained and helping one another through the uncertainty.

“They were feet to the ground,” she said. “Even the town manager, all of them, working and helping.”

That same sense of community is what she hopes won’t be lost as Canton rebuilds.

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Town leaders say the projects will be funded through a combination of FEMA reimbursements, state grants and settlement funds tied to the closure of Pactiv Evergreen. The funding shift means some earlier economic development plans are now on hold.

For Ponton, the focus goes beyond construction timelines or budgets. She hopes the town can preserve pieces of its past, even as it rebuilds for the future.

“I pray that they can hold on to the history and somehow integrate the story, so people will not lose the vision of what this town was,” she said.

For her, and many in Canton, these buildings were never just structures. They were a place to belong.