Public says leave Lindenwood alone at cemetery hearing
Published on November 3rd, 1999
STONEHAM, MA - Lindenwood Cemetery allows "festive" mourning, as a Stoneham veteran said, and people want to keep it that way.
Mourners at Lindenwood, located off Montvale Avenue in Stoneham, can plant their own flowers or shrubs or erect wooden shrines or leave balloons, eternal flames or other holiday decorations at the graves of loved ones.
A group of Stoneham citizens and non-residents with relatives buried at Lindenwood spoke with Town Administrator Jeff Nutting Tuesday night. Nutting wanted to obtain feedback on a draft of new cemetery guidelines which an advisory committee he appointed had prepared.
The first policy questioned was the removal of American flags from veteran graves after 30 days.
The wife of a Stoneham veteran asked why the flags could not stay up all year.
People who work at the cemetery said the flags wear and break over time and are then removed.
Citizens agreed that broken flags should be removed, but disagreed with the proposed policy to remove flags regardless of condition after an arbitrary time period.
Restrictions on what could be placed at grave sites received the most criticism. Several people said they chose Lindenwood because they knew they could leave things, such as birthday balloons or holiday decorations, on their plots.
"I have two babies buried there," one woman said. "My husband and I put up a tree on Christmas; it helps us..."
Dick Waite, a member of the cemetery guidelines advisory committee, said most surrounding communities have adopted restrictions almost identical to those proposed in his committee's draft.
Part-time cemetery volunteer Kathy Danieli said most people do not pick up after themselves, and that is the problem.
"I was picking up Easter eggs in August," Danieli said.
But the majority of the crowd wanted the least restrictive guidelines possible.
"We have heard the will of the people... we will have another hearing after we revise the draft," Nutting said.
But members of the crowd wanted into the process. One woman asked why the group of people present Tuesday could not join the advisory committee.
"We cannot have 23 people on a committee, but you can choose two or three of you to join," Nutting said.
Selectmen Cosmo Ciccarello questioned Nutting's authority to appoint the committee in the first place. The Town Administrator is in charge of setting municipal guidelines, but policy decisions must flow through the Board of Selectmen.
Nutting and Ciccarello disagreed as to the nature of the proposed cemetery rules.
The advisory committee plans to meet again in the near future, and selectmen are considering how they can help with people's concerns about Lindenwood. said.
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