Mayor’s final words on cemetery and undertaker situation

Darrell Bradley

The Lord’s Ridge Cemetery and Eternal Garden are the two resting sites controlled by the Belize City Council. On December seventeenth, 2012, the Council informed undertakers and funeral homes that it would take control of the building of tombs and vaults at these sites to ensure quality control. There has been an expected backlash from funeral directors and undertakers who feel a potential threat to their livelihoods. On Thursday we found one man who was not an employee of the city, who was making a tomb at the Lord Ridge Cemetery. The Mayor said that there is a pauper program to bury the destitute but he agrees that the work should have been carried out by a council employee.

Darrell Bradley, Belize City Mayor

“The regime for the burying of an individual is something that is required of the municipal. So we have to ensure that people are buried. So in law there is provision for what we call pauper burial. So if a person can’t afford a burial, we still have to ensure that that person’s buried because it comes under the mandate of public health. So there are certain things. For example, if somebody comes to us, the fee for an un-tombed grave is two hundred and fifty dollars. And if somebody comes to us and tell us that they can’t afford that, then what we do is that we waive that fee. So we still have to ensure that people are buried. If you want a tomb-grave that’s a thousand dollars. So what we do is that if there may be a situation where you would have an individual who they would have waived the fee for them; what we shouldn’t do is allow them to build the tomb themselves which I believe was what happened in that case.”

Jose Sanchez

“Because there was a gentleman building a tomb yesterday and then Mr. Coye was saying see they can do it, but I can’t.”

Darrell Bradley

“Well I mean that, I don’t know specifically about that situation. I certainly would not authorize any individual to build the tomb themselves because the purpose really of the policy is to ensure quality of care for the building of the tomb. I respect the fact that you need to earn an income; I think that the policy could have been implemented better in terms of dialoguing with persons. And surely if Mister Coye or whomever is saying that there has been coregent evidence of the policy not being followed, that is something that we will investigate in that any person who assisted in that happening; if that did in fact happen, we will deal with them.”