Burials at sea floated

MAYOR Tom Tate says he is determined to make his dream of an underwater cemetery off the Coast a reality to deal with the city’s chronic shortage of available burial plots.

City leaders are scrambling to find a solution to the city’s cemetery crisis after being told this week there was an urgent need to find more space due a 30 per cent spike in burials.

But the Mayor says he wants to revive stalled plans for an underwater burial site similar to one built off of the Florida coastline in the US.

Cr Tate, who this week ruled out supporting a vertical cemetery, said the proposal should be considered as part of community consultation into the future of resting places within the city.

“Any considerations must also assess whether a future phase of our dive site could involve the placement of ashes from loved ones in headstones, reef balls or other innovative underwater memorialisation options,” he said. “These memorials would be lowered to the sea floor and positioned based on GPS-data.

“This would create a fitting underwater cemetery for families who chose this resting place while at the same time, it would create new employment through the design, installation and transport of the memorials as well as commercial divers positioning the memorials.

“Recreational divers with licences to descend 30m could view this memorial site.’’

In 2018 councillors discussed creating a memorial site to allow cremated remains to be interred in an underwater memorial garden off The Spit.

The concept was inspired by the Neptune Memorial Reef near Miami in Florida which was created in 2007 and sits 5km off the coast of Key Biscayne at a depth of 12m. It will eventually be able to hold more than 125,000 remains.

Cr Tate this week said council would also look at other concepts to relieve pressure on the burial plot shortage.

“Today, councils across the world are looking at innovative solutions to the pressures placed on cemetery space. We must do the same and we are,” he said.

“I will ask officers to further explore the concept of families being able to be laid to rest together in mausoleum-style structures as part future updates on the Cemeteries Generations Plan.

A confidential report showed the council was looking at possible new sites, but the cost was expected to run into the millions of dollars and challenges involved finding the right location.