Work under way on new €250,000 cemetery

WORK is under way on a new 2.8 acre cemetery for Murrintown Parish that should last at least 100 years.

And to generate revenue to cover the cost of the €250,000 that has been borrowed to pay for the new cemetery, the parish council is to sell forward grave plots that people from outside the parish will be able to buy.

Situated at Kildavin Lower in the Deerpark on the Johnstown Estate, it is in close proximity to St Catherine’s Church, Murrintown, and the old Graveyard, in Kildavin which was in use in the distant past.

Kildavin Graveyard was enclosed by the Earl and Countess of Granard, Johnstown in the year 1866.

Work on the first phase of the project began on February 8 and is being carried out by contractor John Hayes Jnr. of Clonard.

It is anticipated that this work will be completed by the of Summer 2017 and will accommodate 346 grave plots which will be sufficient for 100 years at an average of three new burials per year.

The graveyard adjoining the present Church which was built in 1838 has served the local community since then but space is running out with only two new grave plots remaining.

This fact taken together with the large increase in population in the Parish made it necessary to develop this new cemetery.

Murrintown Parish Council has over the past 11 years been working to acquire suitable land for this project. On April, 5 last year the Parish Council purchased the 2.8 acres of land from Teagasc Johnstown Castle for €30,000.00. which has been paid from parish funds.

The first phase of the new cemetery will cost in the region of of €250,000, the money being borrowed from the Murrintown/Enniscorthy Credit Union and repaid over a 10-year period.

Committee member Patrick Delaney said the cost of the cemetery will be covered by various fund raising efforts by the Parish Council.

The biggest of these is the well-supported ‘ The Split the Pot’ weekly draw.