I support this bill. The bill provides a way to help preserve cemeteries which is greatly needed. I would like some consideration to being more specific in some instances. "Good faith" does not provide any specific guidelines . It does not indicate who is going to decide whether the petitioner has adequately followed through in searching for the owner of the cemetery. Two notices in the newspaper is not enough especially if the notices are buried in the legal pages of the newspaper. One simple example would be to require a sign to be placed for a couple of months in the cemetery with contact information of the person who is applying to be the petitioner. That was done at an African American cemetery in Fairfax County and both neighbors and descendants replied. Other concerns of mine include: what happens if the petitioner does not adequately maintain the cemetery; will the petitioner's contact information be available for visitors, neighbors, relatives, etc.; what happens if the petitioner needs to relinquish his license; what are the plans for getting a new petitioner. Is any guidance about maintenance provided to the petioner? For example, tree stumps in a cemetery should be leveled but not extracted. Because during removal, the tree roots could damage the coffin and remains. This bill is extremely necessary in helping preserve the cemeteries in Virginia. Mary Lipsey, a member of th Northern Virginia Cemetery Consortium, representing Fairfax County

This bill would prove to aid in Cemetery non-profits in identifying and restoring cemeteries throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia. Cemeteries are a vital part of our state historic resources and the history of Virginia is buried in these vacated cemeteries. This bill would aid in protecting and restoring these important resources.

I am writing in support of HB1237. HB1237 is designed to improve the condition of abandoned private cemeteries by providing a legal mechanism through which nonprofit organizations or adjoining property owners can perform maintenance on them. It fills a gap in the state code by specifically addressing those situations where abandonment has occurred because ownership is unknown or unrecorded, or where an owner has passed without heirs, and it does so while preserving the rights of cemetery owners who may subsequently emerge or be discovered. When abandoned cemeteries become overgrown, filled with debris, damaged by the elements, or otherwise neglected, members of the public often demand action from local governments, or simply trespass on the property to address the situation. A variety of nonprofit organizations exist that are dedicated to cemetery preservation, but current law limits maintenance petitions to local governing bodies or adjoining property owners and does not fully address situations where an owner of a cemetery is unknown, difficult to determine, or effectively unreachable due to distance, illness, or some other factor. This legislation permits both adjoining property owners and incorporated nonprofit organizations to petition the court for an exclusive, limited-time, renewable license to perform cemetery maintenance upon a showing that a cemetery’s owner of record or their heirs cannot be identified and contacted, or are dead, and that the petitioner has met a publication notice requirement. The type of maintenance that petitioner seeks to perform is limited to actions enumerated in the legislation (which are similar to those permitted in the Virginia Historical African American Cemetery and Graves Fund). Upon the granting of a license, petitioner will have the same obligations as the law imposes on other non-owners with a right of access (i.e., plot owners, descendants of buried individuals, or genealogical researchers), and any owner who subsequently emerges will have the same liability protections as under current law. Additionally, if a formerly-unknown owner emerges, they shall be entitled to petition the court to terminate the license. By expanding who may petition the court to perform cemetery maintenance at their own expense, by specifically addressing situations where ownership cannot reasonably be identified, and by preserving the rights of any owners later to emerge, this legislation significantly advances opportunities to improve the condition of private cemeteries without imposing additional burdens on local governments, cemetery owners, or taxpayers, and reduces the likelihood that graveyards with historical or cultural value will be lost, forgotten, or destroyed. Thank you for your time and consideration of this legislation Earnie Porta, JD, PhD