Boise, Idaho ? Stonemason Mario Hernandez can’t help but hope that Idaho’s new human rights memorial will help the state shed its image as a haven for hate-mongering racists.

“This will make people nicer to each other,” Hernandez said, pointing to his finishing touches on huge slabs of marble inscribed with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. “I’m happy it’s here.”

Les Bock, executive director of the Idaho Human Rights Education Center, stands next to a bronze statue of Anne Frank in the new Anne Frank Human Rights Memorial in Boise. The new memorial is to be dedicated Friday.

Idaho the longtime home of the Aryan Nations and other white separatist groups has been planning the Anne Frank Human Rights Memorial since 1995. Built by the private Idaho Human Rights Education Center, the memorial will be dedicated Friday.

“The memorial will stand as a statement that a lot of Idahoans have a real commitment to human rights,” said Marilyn Schulder, the former director of the state’s Human Rights Commission.

“People can point at this along with the Black History Museum, the Basque Museum and the Hispanic Cultural Center when they talk about our state.”

Others aren’t so sure that a $1.5 million memorial is enough to erase the cross burnings, arson attacks and anti-Semitic graffiti scrawled across Idaho’s past.

“It can’t hurt, but public relations gestures well, people take them as such,” said James Aho, a sociology professor at Idaho State University and author of two books on racism in Idaho. “I’m not saying this memorial is bad at all. It’s just that we don’t learn our lessons that easily.”

The push for a permanent memorial began after 50,000 people visited an Anne Frank exhibit here seven years ago. The plan evolved into a broader look at human rights and gained the support of Idaho children, who collected thousands of pennies, and philanthropist Greg Carr, who donated $500,000.

The statue of Anne Frank stands inside a replica of the attic where the Jewish teenager hid from the Nazis. The statue is surrounded by three reflecting pools, an amphitheater and a wall of travertine marble bearing 60 quotes from inspirational figures from around the world.