Avon Residents Fight to Reopen Cemetery for Burials

AVON — With the budget for the town put into place and the year’s end approaching, Avon residents seek to make plans for their final resting place.

The South Avon Cemetery has been on the minds of many South Avon residents as the board continues to deliberate on whether or not to open the historic cemetery back up for cremation only burials, for people whose last desire is to be put to rest in the place they call home.

“I wanted to stir things up a bit in the discussion of the cemetery,” said Betty Hanna, South Avon resident. “It is not only myself that is interested in being buried in the South Avon Cemetery.”

According to David LeFeber, Avon Town Supervisor, the board has been talking about the status of the cemetery for quite some time.

“Our concern is we don’t want to disturb any unmarked graves,” said LeFeber.

According to the Avon website, the South Avon Cemetery opened in 1813 and has been inactive since 1992.

“We are not 100% sure of the capabilities of Larsen Engineering to find all of the existing graves,” said Jim Blye, Avon Town Councilman.

Larsen Engineering performed a survey to pinpoint existing graves located at the South Avon Cemetery, according to officials the results are not 100% accurate.

According to Robert Ayers, Avon Town Councilman, if the South Avon Cemetery was opened back up it would have to be for cremation only burials as their is no access to the cemetery for full body burials, everything would have to be carried in by hand including the head stone.

“At this point, with the amount of money, I don’t like the idea of cremation only burials, I don’t believe we should go back into our pioneer cemetery,” said Ayers.

According to Hanna, there are approximately 30 people that she knows of that would like to be buried in the South Avon Cemetery. According to the survey done by Larsen Engineering there are approximately 182 open graves.

“I am hoping we can open the cemetery for these people some how,” said LeFeber.

After much deliberation the board decided to look into the cost of reopening the cemetery and plans on putting together a proposal for the public to see, however no time frame was given as to when this proposal is to be expected.