Challenge Ahead for Cemetery Site

Rules covering how close cemeteries can be to waterways will be challenged to allow the extension of Temuka’s cemetery.

The Timaru District Council is looking for new space for the Temuka and Timaru cemeteries, and the district services committee is supporting the Temuka community board’s wish to extend its cemetery to the north, on council land purchased years ago for that purpose.

However, Environment Canterbury’s draft national resources regional plan has a rule that says cemeteries should not be within 50 metres of a waterway — and the Taumatakahu Stream runs through the land, potentially limiting the amount of space available for burials.

Temuka councillor Pat Mulvey said the community board was strong on wanting to retain the Temuka site, and carry out soil and water testing in order to challenge Ecan’s 50-metre rule.

He had discussed the issue with a local undertaker of some 50 years’ standing, who had said there were no issues with water leaching into graves within 15 metres of the creek in the existing cemetery.

"So if no water is leaching in, it’s reasonable to assume nothing from the graves is leaching out into waterways."

Cr Ian Bowan agreed, saying the land to the north of the cemetery dried out quicker than where people were being buried at present.

"The 50-metre rule is ridiculous. The land was bought in the knowledge we were going to use that land for the cemetery. It was bought to extend the present cemetery. People don’t want to move somewhere else. I think we have got to go the extra mile and satisfy Ecan that we are able to use that extension of the cemetery."

Councillors also asked whether it would be possible to move the creek, so that more available cemetery land was outside the 50 metre exclusion zone. They accepted that option would come down to resource consents and funding, but Cr Richard Lyon said there would be money involved no matter what way they went about it.

Timaru mayor Janie Annear said that while she understood the sentiments, she did wonder whether, in this "risk averse world", how successful the council would be in its challenge.

The committee recommended the council allocate $25,000 towards investigations and planning when it considered its budget.

Staff are to investigate council-owned land near the existing Timaru cemetery for possible expansion.

n Herald Staff

(c) 2007 Timaru Herald. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.