New cemetery coming for Manchester, says mayor
MANDEVILLE, Manchester — With concerns mounting about cemeteries running out of burial space and residents of Melrose Mews growingly becoming uneasy with the management of a cemetery there, Mandeville Mayor Donovan Mitchell says within a few months a new cemetery will be in this south-central parish.
The proposed location for the new cemetery is a few miles south of Mandeville.
“We had said we will look at new cemeteries in the parish [and] we are assiduously working on that. We have indicated to the National Land Agency [NLA] about some lands that have been used and returned to the commissioner of lands. We are getting a positive response on that where we know of the two plots of lands we are looking at,” he told the Jamaica Observer.
The Observer was told that the location is on mined-out lands, and Mitchell said bauxite companies have been integral in giving parcels of cemeteries, down the years, in Manchester.
Bauxite mining companies often exhume human remains found on formerly privately owned lands, and rebury them in approved cemeteries as part of their operations.
Manchester Municipal Corporation took control of Melrose Cemetery in 2012 ,after it closed the 80-yearold Mandeville Municipal Cemetery on Grove Road, restricting the latter location to burials in reserved spots.
“Melrose was not really a public cemetery; it was a cemetery for the relocation due to the Alcan subdivision of Melrose Gardens and its environs. However, they had turned it over to us for us to manage it and because we had to close the Mandeville cemetery, people are being buried there,” said Mitchell.
However, he said residents of Melrose Mews have complained about the management of the cemetery, pointing out issues of traffic congestion and disruptions in their community during burials.
“It has been worsened by comments from the Melrose citizens that they are not at peace, because sometimes the amount of traffic that goes through that community or park at people’s gate impedes the movements of these persons,” he said.
“We are moving assiduously to have that cemetery used for just what it was for and then we will move to get the other public cemeteries that we are looking at. Give us a few months and we should be able to give you something positive,” added Mitchell.
The mayor opted not to name the proposed location of the new cemetery.
“It is difficult for people to keep moving all their loved ones from south Manchester to the middle of the parish. We are looking at expanding one and looking at some new land where we had some indication that land would be given for that purpose,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mitchell said Cocoa Walk Cemetery in south Manchester is to be expanded.
And he reiterated his view for consideration to be given to crypt burials.
The crypt is like a grave, except it is above ground and can be in a mausoleum (building) or outdoors in a cemetery.
“In Pennsylvania they had that sort of crypt burial but you know Jamaica is a funny place,” he said, while pointing out that some people still have reservations about cremations.
“They don’t like to ‘burn bodies’, as we would say. It is most likely that you would get a pushback on the crypt because it is putting the bodies in a building and a wall — that is how they do them there. People look at the environmental issues and all of that but the one I had seen abroad is a very huge one,” added Mitchell.
He, however, said sepulchre burials are not allowed.
“The burial within town limits does not subscribe to sepulchres — and that is a matter of law. You really ought not to be using sepulchres. Most of the sepulchres will start six to eight inches deep in the ground. You can’t have a body buried above ground in a vault. Sometimes, because of bad work, you might have these sepulchres opening up and it creates some health hazard — and you don’t know what were the conditions that these persons died [from],” he said.
He said the council has ordered the demolition of sepulchres in the past.
“We have done so before, lick it down. They have to do a vault,” said Mitchell.