By CATHY ARONSON
Mourners have been allowed to keep gardens on lawn graves while the Thames Coromandel District Council reviews its cemetery bylaw.
In May the council apologised for sending letters to eight people asking them to remove planted gardens to allow easier access for the lawn-mowing contractor.
The letters caused an uproar from bereaved families.
At least two people vowed to physically block the removal of their gardens.
Council community facilities manager Alex Finn said the letters were sent to people with gardens on a mown lawn section of the cemetery.
Under the cemetery bylaw people could have gardens only in the monument section.
Mayor Chris Lux said the confusion highlighted the need to review the cemetery bylaw.
The council plans to avoid future problems by including a communication policy in the bylaw to ensure that bereaved people understand the difference between plots.
Mr Lux said families were not made aware of the difference between plots before buying a burial site and attempts to explain the difference afterwards were stressful for them.
He said the families who already had garden memorials in the lawn section could keep them while the bylaw was reviewed.
The council would probably decide during the review that such families could keep their gardens indefinitely.
"The bylaw wasn't articulated well and the council didn't manage the situation well, so it would now be insensitive to take the gardens away from these people."
One of the people who was asked to remove her garden, Karen Cookson, had vowed to camp by her garden if necessary to keep the council out.
Once a week Ms Cookson visits the plot of her son, Waharoa Albert Morehu, at Totara Cemetery.
He died aged 19 in June 1997 on the way home to New Plymouth after visiting his mother on her 37th birthday.
The review of the 1995 bylaw will also look at the management and maintenance of the council's seven cemeteries.
The final draft of the revised bylaw will be open for submissions in November and the bylaw will be adopted next April.
Garden graves to stay - for now
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.