[Approved 10-17-1967 by Ch. No. 1135 as Secs. 7-7 and 7-9
through 7-25 of the 1966 Code]
No person shall bury or cause to be buried the
body of any deceased person in the city, except in such grounds as
are or may be designated as burying grounds and authorized to be used
as such.
No cemetery or place of burial or interment
shall be established or used within the city until the City Council
shall have granted a permit for the same.
Before the permit required by the preceding
section shall be granted, a petition and plat shall be filed with
the City Clerk describing briefly the land desired and petition signed
by the person desiring the same. This petition shall be advertised
at least once a week for three (3) successive weeks in some public
newspaper published in the city before the same shall be acted upon
by the City Council.
The Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council
may make such rules and regulations for the management and care of
the city's cemeteries as may be necessary or expedient, provided that
such order, rules and regulations shall first be reported to and approved
by the City Council.
No person shall locate with any vehicle, stand
or basket within two hundred (200) feet of Oak Grove or Mineral Spring
Cemeteries for the purpose of selling or offering for sale any fruit
or other article.
The Superintendent of Public Works is hereby
authorized to purchase, in the name of and on behalf of the city,
from time to time, lots in the city cemeteries which the owners thereof
desire to dispose of at such price as he or she may deem reasonable
and for the best interest of the city. The purchase of such lots and
the price paid for them shall be approved by the Committee on Cemeteries
of the City Council. The amount paid for all such purchases shall
be charged to the annual appropriation for care and maintenance of
cemeteries, provided that in no one (1) year shall an amount exceeding
three hundred dollars ($300.) be expended for such purpose, except
by vote of the City Council.
A.
Burial lots owned by the city in any of the public
cemeteries will be sold to such persons as apply therefor, but purchasers
thereof will hold their lots, and their titles will be subject to
all the provisions of this Code and other city ordinances that relate
to the cemeteries and burial grounds of the city and subject to all
such rules and regulations as may be from time to time approved by
the Director of Public Safety and the City Council for the care and
management thereof.
B.
The price of all burial lots hereafter sold by the
city shall be fixed by the Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council.
C.
Application for the purchase of burial lots shall
be made to the Superintendent of Public Works.
D.
The City Clerk is hereby authorized and empowered
to execute deeds of burial lots in the name of the city and to affix
the corporate Seal of the city to each deed upon receiving the amount
fixed by the Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council for lots,
and in addition thereto, the sum of one dollar ($1.) for making and
recording each of such deeds. Whenever any such sale shall be made
of a portion of a platted lot, or any lot not designated upon a plat
recorded in the City Clerk's office, the Superintendent shall have
the description of the lot so sold prepared by the City Engineer.
All such deeds shall be in a form to be approved by the City Solicitor
and shall be recorded in a book to be specially kept in the City Clerk's
office for that purpose.
A.
No headstone or monument of any kind shall be erected
or located in any city cemetery and no vault shall be constructed
therein except with the approval of the Superintendent of Public Works.
B.
No grave shall be opened in any city cemetery except
upon application to the Superintendent of Public Works. Such work
shall be done by city employees under the direction of the Superintendent
of Public Works.
No person owning any lot in any city cemetery
shall sell any single graves therein. An application for preparing
a grave for the burial of any person not a relative of the owner of
record of any such lot shall be prima facie evidence of such sale
of a single grave, and the Superintendent of Public Works shall thereupon
refuse to have such grave prepared until such owner shall present
satisfactory evidence to the Superintendent or to the Committee on
Cemeteries of the City Council that such burial is not a violation
of the provisions of this section.
A.
The Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council shall
set apart a suitable section in the Oak Grove Cemetery in which single
graves will be sold at a price to be fixed by the Committee from time
to time. Such sales shall be made by the Superintendent of Public
Works. All such sales shall be subject to any and all rules and regulations
which from time to time may be made by the Committee on Cemeteries
and approved by the City Council. The amounts received from such sales
shall be paid by the Superintendent of Public Works to the Director
of Finance on or before the third business day of the succeeding month.
B.
The section designated as the single-grave section
in the Oak Grove Cemetery shall be cared for by the Superintendent
of Public Works in like manner as lots under perpetual care.
A.
The City Council shall take and hold to themselves
and to their successors in office all such lands within this city
as shall be conveyed to them in trust for burial purposes; and in
like manner shall receive and hold all funds that shall be conveyed
to them for the purpose of ornamenting or keeping in repair such burial
lots and any other burial lots within the city, and shall execute
such trusts in accordance with the terms contained in the instrument
of conveyance.
B.
Duties of Director of Finance.
(1)
The Director of Finance is hereby authorized and directed
to receive all such lands and funds, and to have the charge, custody
and management thereof under the advice and direction of the Committee
on Cemeteries of the city, subject to the ordinances ordained and
orders and rules which may be from time to time ordained and approved
by the City Council.
(2)
The Director of Finance shall invest the funds so
received according to his or her best judgment for the purpose of
deriving an income therefrom and shall keep an account of the same,
and report the particulars thereof in connection with his or her annual
report and at such other times as the City Council may request.
C.
All interest received from bequest funds for the care
of specified private lots shall be kept as a separate fund and shall
be used only for the care of the private lots. No part of such funds
shall be used on any lot in excess of the amount of interest received
for such lot, except by a unanimous vote of the Committee on Cemeteries
of the City Council or such other body as may at the time of the vote
have the supervision of the city's cemeteries.
D.
The Director of Finance is hereby authorized to pay
over to the Superintendent of Public Works so much of the income from
bequest funds as may be needed from time to time, and the Superintendent
of Public Works shall cause the same to be faithfully expended upon
the several lots and enclosures for which the income shall have been
respectively intended by the donors of the fund and estates and in
the manner contemplated in the several instruments creating the trusts,
provided that all payments by the Director of Finance shall be approved
by the Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council. All expenditures
thereof by the Superintendent of Public Works shall be under the direction
of the Committee on Cemeteries of the City Council.
A.
The receipts from the sale of lots in any cemetery
owned by the city shall be used for the capital improvement of cemeteries
owned by the city.
B.
A fund is hereby created of such receipts to be known
as the "Cemeteries Improvement Fund." Such fund and any accruals thereon
shall be invested by the Director of Finance in bonds or notes of
the city or any other safe and productive securities, provided that
all such investments shall be approved by the Committee on Cemeteries
of the City Council. No withdrawals shall be made from the Cemeteries
Improvement Fund except under authority of a resolution of the City
Council.
C.
All other receipts from city cemeteries, except special
bequest funds, shall be used for the general care, preservation and
maintenance of city cemeteries, and the City Council shall annually
appropriate, in addition to such receipts, such sum as may be required
to provide such proper care, preservation and maintenance.
No lots of land adjoining land which has been
known and used as burial grounds shall be deemed a portion of such
burial grounds, unless such lots shall also have been used as burial
grounds.
The Superintendent of Public Works is hereby
directed to have perpetual care taken of the Tower Post lot in Mineral
Spring Cemetery. The expense of the same shall be charged to the appropriation
for cemeteries.
