Wringing Out the Dead: City's Looking to Shake Some Pocket Change Out of Cemeteries

That headline, though, isn't the real takeaway from this Transportation and Environment Committee briefing prepped for next week's meeting, during which assistant city manager Jill Jordan will suggest how to make $12,000 this year and $20,000 annually after that by going after delinquent cemetery owners who owe stormwater fees. Nope...

By Robert Wilonsky

November 13, 2009

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That headline, though, isn't the real takeaway from this Transportation and Environment Committee briefing prepped for next week's meeting, during which assistant city manager Jill Jordan will suggest how to make $12,000 this year and $20,000 annually after that by going after delinquent cemetery owners who owe stormwater fees. Nope. The real story here is that local historian Frances James, who knows this city's cemeteries better than the ghosts who populate 'em, has determined that out of Dallas's "63 unique cemetery locations," almost half of them (30) are considered abandoned. Those are just a few of them above; the city can't track down their owners. Which isn't so much spooky as it is, well, sad. I feel a cover story coming on.

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