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Knoxville Investigates Cemetery Finances
There are no solutions yet, but the City of Knoxville's cemetery has lost money for years, and the City Council is trying to solve that problem.

Aldermen Monday night discussed what to do to bring more money into the city's cemetery fund. City Treasurer Jim Whitney says the cemetery has lost over 40-thousand dollars over the last five years.

One of the ways Whitney suggests making up some of that money is raising fees.

"We charge at this time $400 to dig a grave. I don't think you can find a contractor anywhere that'll come to your house with an $80,000 excavator and a $50,000 truck, and two guys, and spend an hour digging a hole, haul the dirt away on the truck, and come back four or five hours later put part of the dirt back in, clean it up as best as possible and six or eight weeks later come back and clean it up and seed it for $400."

Other suggestions included increasing grave opening fees, possibly creating a pet cemetery, using a special chemical on the grass in the cemetery so it doesn't have to be mowed at much, or using jail inmates to do some of the maintenance instead of street department workers.

Aldermen took no action, and it's not clear when they'll revisit the issue.
01 05 11 by Newsroom
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