After the Warren Funeral Home fiasco of last summer, African-American residents of Columbia, Missouri felt they had no place to go. Now Tom May, owner of H.T. May & Son Funeral Home, has had a property re-zoned to allow him to fill that void.

He’s purchased a former Jehovah’s Witnesses building, and Columbia City Council approved the rezoning. There were some objections, but the application was single-use, and May agreed to work with the neighbors to address concerns.

Macon-Bibb County commissioners voted on November 4 to require a leak-proof casket or vault for all burials in the county, effectively killing a business and zoning proposal by Elizabeth Collins and James Wood. They had purchased 58 acres near Macon, and intended to create a 7,500 body green cemetery, but neighbors lobbied the commissioners for the law change. The land is still zoned for a cemetery, but the requirement for leak-proof burial containers runs counter to Collins’ ideals.

Service Corporation International has withdrawn its rezoning application in Newport News, Virginia. The funeral service provider had sought to rezone land within its Peninsula Memorial Park to build a funeral home there.

This is the third application the company has submitted, and each time, there has been much opposition. Most citizens are fearful that SCI’s presence will take too much business away from local funeral homes. City officials say a funeral home is not in keeping with their long-range plan for that area, which calls for green space. The city is researching legislative means to prevent any entity from rezoning or building withing a cemetery.

Sabine Hirschauer of the Daily Press has more.

An environmental group is trying to block construction of a funeral home in Harmony TWP, New Jersey. The Harmony Township Land Use Board has already signed off on plans by Tom Balka, of McFadden Funeral Home in Belvidere, but The League for Real Smart Growth has sued, claiming the proposed construction violates township ordinances regarding sloped lots.

Carr-Yager Funeral Home, in Columbia, Missouri, is buying a former Church of God facility for use as a funeral home. Columbia City Council gave its approval to a rezoning request Monday night. There’s more coverage at the Missiourian website.

Carr-Yager also has a chapel in Fayette, Missouri.

A church near Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania is gaining new life. The former St. Joseph’s Church in Port Griffith is being converted to a funeral home, by a member of the old St. Joseph’s Parish. The Township Zoning Board approved the rezoning, with the only stipulation being an opaque fence around the back of the funeral home.

The Cornelius, North Carolina Planning Board wants a funeral home to build a buffer behind their proposed building, so traffic on nearby I-70 won’t see the back of the building. Here’s what’s there now, if Google Street View has the address right:

View Larger Map
The planning board doesn’t want signage that’s viewable from the freeway, either, nor do they want drivers to be able to see the hearses parked there.

The funeral home is wanting to renovate a 30-year-old structure that’s currently not in use, and provide a few more jobs, and a valuable service to the community, and all vice chairman John Hettwer can come up with is

“I’m disappointed that we’ll be left with a less-than-desirable structure many years into the future.”

How disappointing. It’s a funeral home. Death is a fact of life. Why try to hide the facility? That only adds to the stigma surrounding funeral homes. This brings to mind the Gladstone quote:

Show me the manner in which a nation or community cares for its dead and I will measure with mathematical exactness the tender sympathies of its people, their respect for the laws of the land and their loyalty to high ideals.

Waynesville, MO, southwest of St Louis, may be getting a crematorium. Waynesville Memorial Chapel plans to install a crematory if City Council affirms the zoning recommendation Thursday evening. The city Planning and Zoning Commission approved the application Tuesday evening.

Affected residents had several questions about the facility and how it might affect property values, but most seemed satisfied with the answers from owner Randy Walters.

Wikipedia has a good entry on cremation.