POWAY -- Years of talk and preparation turned into action Thursday when the city broke ground on the first phase of an education complex at Poway's Kumeyaay center.

Two members of the San Pasqual Mission Band of Indians joined city officials and Friends of the Kumeyaay volunteers at a ceremony that included an American Indian sage-burning, or smudging, ritual held to cleanse the Silver Lake Drive site.

Taking hold of ceremonial shovels, officials then turned over some dirt on the 5-acre property, which was once part of an ancient Kumeyaay village.

Bulldozers are scheduled to start moving a lot more dirt on the property next week, when the three-part construction project gets fully under way. When the first phase is finished sometime in June at a cost of $558,736, the Kumeyaay-Ipai Interpretative Center will have gained an access road, several parking spaces, a retaining wall and underground utilities.

A freshly graded area will also stand ready to receive two relocatable buildings to be added in the project's second phase. The portables will provide temporary space for indoor displays about the Kumeyaay and office space for the center's staff and volunteers.

Poway plans to replace the temporary structure with a permanent, 5,000-square-foot education center as soon as money for that part of the project can be raised.

San Pasqual Nation member Dorothy Tavui, who has spent hundreds of hours sharing her knowledge of American Indian history with schoolchildren who visit the site, said Thursday that she was thrilled to see the city take its commitment to preserving the property -- and Kumeyaay culture -- to the next level.

"I think there's always value in people's history and traditions -- I don't care what nationality," she said.

The preservation effort began in the late 1990s, after city officials realized the hilltop on which the interpretative center sits was a treasure trove of grinding stones, or "metates," pottery shards, rock paintings and other glimpses into the lives of American Indians who lived there roughly 300 years ago. A handful of volunteers then spent untold hours and weekends clearing graffiti, broken glass and other debris that transients and partying teens had left on the site before Poway acquired it.

In 2000, the city named the center, signed a development agreement with the San Pasqual tribe, and began setting money aside for the education center project. The 280-member tribe is based on a 1,300-acre reservation about 15 miles northeast of Escondido.

The city went on to develop a master plan for the center and hire architectural firm KTU+A to design the education center. The City Council approved the development plan in June 2006, and Poway began applying for and receiving a series of grants to help pay for the project's first phase.

An average of 1,500 Poway Unified School District third-graders currently visit the center in an average year as part of their history studies. The center is also open to the public on the third Saturday of every month.

Visitors can stroll along stone-edged walkways that offer views of plants the Kumeyaay used for food and medicine, stand inside a reed-and-willow meeting house known as an "ewaa" to the Kumeyaay or listen as docents explain how the metates were used to grind acorns into an edible paste used as a food staple.

The permanent education center's design includes 5,000 square feet of space that includes a multipurpose room, administrative office, kitchen, restrooms and storage space. Although no one knows when the entire project might be finished, Friends President Mike Horan said he and other longtime interpretative center supporters were "stoked" to see the groundbreaking take place.

"We worked a long time to get to this point, and to finally see it come to fruition is just really fantastic," he said.

- Contact staff writer Andrea Moss at (760) 739-6654 or amoss@nctimes.com.