Many other cemeteries all over the country are also choosing to do the same so that they can save space instead of burying a funeral urn like some like to do. We understand that due to some traditional beliefs, such as those of the Catholics, if a person chooses to be cremated, they must also be buried as well. By adding the columbarium to cemeteries that have minimal space left for grave sites, they can put up to 72 funeral urns, neatly displayed, into each columbarium that is added to the area.

Some cemeteries are in need of the space so badly; families that have mausoleums in their cemeteries are volunteering to have them torn down for a place in the columbarium. For each mausoleum in a cemetery, approximately four graves could be put there instead. One cemetery caretaker stated that people that had their funeral urns are coming to him asking to have them exhumed to help save space. They see that it was a ridiculous waste to have it buried as they could have displayed it nicely in their own homes or in the columbarium. With so many people trying to go green, they also feel that it was a waste of natural resources that they didn’t fully understand when their loved one was being buried.

Thousands of horrified family members converged upon the cemetery, looking for answers. To some, the disruption of a loved one’s remains ripped open the wounds of grief, and survivors felt as if they were experiencing the death and loss for the first time. More than 200 families planned to file a class-action lawsuit against the cemetery’s owners. According to lead attorney Paul Shuldiner, “There’s a lot of grief, bewilderment and anger” among the families. Understandably so.

What happened at Burr Oak Cemetery?
Burr Oak is ­– or was – the final resting place of approximately 100,000 people. It is a historic cemetery, where many prominent African Americans are buried, including Emmett Till, the 14-year-old whose lynching and torture in 1955 in Mississippi helped ignite the civil rights movement, as well as blues singers Dinah Washington and Willie Dixon, boxer Ezzard Charles, and several Negro League baseball players.

Four current and former cemetery employees, including the manager, have been charged with dismemberment of human bodies, a felony that carries a sentence of 6 to 30 years in prison upon conviction. At a news conference, Dart said he suspected that “irregularities” had occurred at the cemetery for at least four years and possibly much longer. He also warned that the desecration could involve many more bodies than the original estimate of 300.

Why did they do it? Greed, according to officials, who say the accused employees resold burial plots and split the money they made, approximately $300,000. To make room for the new burials, the cemetery workers allegedly excavated some caskets and dumped human remains and headstones in an unused part of the cemetery. In other cases the workers crushed caskets into the ground and buried new ones on top of them.

Families who want to know what happened to their loved one’s remains may be in for a long and frustrating wait. Members of FBI evidence-recovery teams, some of whom worked on the 1995 Oklahoma City federal building bombing and the 9/11 crash of United Flight 93 in Pennsylvania, are sifting through evidence. According to FBI spokesman Ross Rice, it’s impossible to estimate how long the probe will take.

If there’s a hero in this story, it’s the cemetery worker, referred to as “Employee A” in court documents, who accidentally came upon evidence of the disturbed graves. Ignoring warnings from the exposed workers to keep his discovery to himself or risk losing his job, he told another coworker about what he’d seen, and that coworker reported the crime to the cemetery’s owners.

Hawaii’s cremation rate highest in nation
Almost 70% of Hawaiians are cremated at death, making Hawaii’s cremation rate the highest in the nation, according to The Cremation Association of North America. One reason so many islanders choose cremation is to serve the greater good – Hawaii’s land shortage is a perennial concern, and cremation is seen as a responsible way to preserve open lands for future generations.

Those who choose to donate their bodies prior to cremation not only leave a gift of life through the advancement of medical research, but also have the relief of knowing that their loved ones will not be saddled with the expense of a traditional funeral, which can run as high as $10,000 or more.

Gifts for Life less restrictive than other donor programs
While the desire to leave a meaningful legacy runs high, good intentions often aren’t enough. Medical schools that accept whole body donations are often governed by strict exclusionary regulations. Many schools, for instance, will not accept donations from people who have undergone amputations or donated health organs to save another’s life. Some programs also charge a hefty fee to the family or estate of the deceased for transportation of the body to the medical school.

Gifts for Life, in contrast, accepts virtually all donations except in cases of communicable diseases like AIDS, Hepatitis B or Hepatitis C; extensive trauma at death; or advanced decomposition, which would make the body unsuitable for anatomical study. There is no upper age limit for whole body donation, nor does amputation automatically preclude acceptance.

“Being able to receive donations for learning is imperative to ground-breaking medical research,” says Dr. Greg Gerber of Gifts for Life, noting that there is no computer model or other acceptable substitute for a human cadaver in anatomical research.

How it works
State of Hawaii laws (HRS 327) permit an individual 18 years or older to donate his or her body to an appropriate organization, such as Gifts For Life. If an individual dies without signing a donation form, the next-of-kin or personal agent may authorize the donation of the remains, but if the donor is still living, he or she must personally complete the donation process. Gifts for Life will mail donation forms upon request, or the forms may be downloaded from the organization’s website (http://www.giftsforlifehawaii.com). The forms must be filled out and returned to GFL (the services of a lawyer or notary are not required to complete the process). Upon examination of the documents, GFL staff will issue a letter of acceptance and a donor identification card.

The only cost to the family or estate “may be the cost of transporting the deceased to a facility with refrigerated holding facilities (mortuary) if the person dies at home or in a facility that does not have refrigerated holding facilities,” according to GFL’s website.

Following study of the body, typically within 3 months after the donation, Gifts for Life will cremate the remains and either return them to the family or perform a memorial ceremony on the peaceful waters surrounding the islands.

Military Cremation Urns and Flag Case

In the U.S., we honor the veterans of our Armed Forces for their service and their sacrifice. The cost of serving one’s country is great, after all; military personnel typically face financial hardship, prolonged separation from their loved ones, and tremendous risk of physical, mental or emotional illness and injury. Some pay the ultimate price, dying in service to their country.

But many veterans die in poverty, and while the U.S. government provides funeral benefits for qualifying veterans, gaining access to those benefits can be a challenge. In many cases, families may not know or understand the benefits their loved one is entitled to, or they may not know how to claim them.

Kindness and Gratitude, Multiplied
A couple of years ago, Andy Scheid, of Andrew T. Scheid Funeral Home in Millersville, Pennsylvania, learned of a World War II veteran who had died penniless. Scheid was moved by the veteran’s unfortunate circumstance to provide, at no charge, a burial with full military honors, even ensuring that the deceased, a Purple Heart recipient, had a proper suit to wear.

As a result of that experience and his determination to help other veterans and their families, Scheid became a provider of Veterans Funeral Care (VFC) services.

Veterans Funeral Care
Founded in Clearwater, Florida as “the first full-service funeral home in America built to serve the veteran and military community,” VFC has grown into a network of more than 100 providers, all dedicated to assisting loved ones with every detail of cremation and funeral arrangements for veterans and their families. Beyond coordinating funeral logistics, VFC also assists families in applying for all applicable veterans’ benefits, Social Security benefits, and life insurance and arranging military honors.

Veterans Funeral Care purports to save families up to 40% on the cost of a traditional funeral or cremation. A good part of that savings comes from taking advantage of available veterans’ benefits, such as burial in a national cemetery. All honorably discharged veterans and their spouses and dependent children are entitled to a free burial plot, cemetery marker and burial vault at any national cemetery, which can add up to a savings of $6,000, according to the VFC website. With the cost of a traditional funeral often exceeding $10,000 in the U.S., the average cost of just under $3,800 for a VFC funeral is a godsend for many veterans and their families.

“Private or general, you’re all the same”
Scheid, whose interest in veterans’ causes stems from his father’s service during the Korean War era, says his primary goal is to make sure veterans’ families are aware of all the benefits they’re entitled to. “(T)he majority of veterans are not wealthy people. Whether you’re a private or a general, you’re all the same,” says Scheid.

The kindness of strangers
Paul Betts, a former highway designer, heard a radio report last year about the increasing number of unclaimed bodies resulting from the recession. Perhaps the deceased were estranged from loved ones, or perhaps families lacked the funds to provide a proper funeral. Betts understood that Wayne County had a contract with a local funeral home to bury the dead, but the fact that no one was present to mourn their passing troubled him deeply.

A call to the county coroner put Betts in touch with Bill Kiesgen, the funeral director at Perry Funeral Home. The state and county pay the funeral home $700 per cremation or burial, and the funeral home splits the fee with the cemetery. Together, Betts and Kiesgen devised a plan to hold a monthly  prayer service for the deceased who have no one else to pray for them. As Betts saw it, “We’ve got a lot of abandoned buildings we can’t do anything about. Abandoned people, we can at least pray for.”

Although the Unclaimed Friends services, held on the third Wednesday of every month, are open to everyone, most of those who attend are members of the Episcopal parish where Betts is a member. Kiesgen supplies a white rose for each of the deceased – in March, there were 24 white roses – and Betts gives a metal angel to each of the guests. One by one, the names of the deceased are read aloud, and mourners respond, “May he (or she) rest in peace.”

Everyone deserves a farewell
“Everyone deserves some sort of a farewell,” according to Kiesgen, who doesn’t judge the families of the deceased, reasoning that they may have faced a choice of whether to feed their living members or bury the one who died.

Following the service, Betts encourages the guests to pass their angels and roses on to others with a request that they, too, pray for the stranger whose name is on the rose. He thanks everyone for coming and expresses his hope that by participating in the service, they have made Detroit a little kinder place.

Affordable Cremation Urns

The funeral business has always been considered recession-proof. Everyone dies eventually, after all, guaranteeing an endless customer base. And, with the rapid aging of the ubiquitous baby boom generation, the demand for funeral goods and services is sure to rise in the coming years. But demand is only part of the equation; today, more and more families are opting out of the expensive frills that escalate funeral costs.

Only “the best” for your loved one
I was 25 when my father-in-law died suddenly, and although I had no experience in such matters, I was designated to make arrangements. I recall the funeral director steering toward a high-end casket and describing the $10,000 funeral that went with it. “Surely, you’ll want the best for your father?” he said.

A faint smile crossed my lips; not only was my name not Shirley, but this funeral director obviously didn’t know Jack (which happened to be the name of my father-in-law). Jack would drive halfway across town to save a penny on a gallon of gas. When I went shopping – for groceries, clothing, or whatever – Jack, who virtually lived with my family, would ask how much I paid for a given item, eagerly waiting for my reply before he gleefully told me what a sap I was and where I could have gotten it cheaper. A thrifty but lovable curmudgeon, that Jack.

“Can we see something more affordable, please?” I replied. “Best,” after all, is in the eye of the beholder.

Affordable Cremation Urns

Consumers demand flexible, lower-cost funerals
That was many years ago, long before the global recession of the early 21st century. Bargain shopping for funeral goods and services wasn’t yet in vogue, but the lessons I gleaned from that experience made it easier for me to assist my own parents in planning their funerals a decade later.

Today, many factors have influenced the shift in the way we approach funerals. The Federal Trade Commission’s Funeral Rule requires full price disclosure by providers of funeral goods and services, and allows families to choose only those items they want and need. And savvy, cash-strapped consumers are opting not only for “the best,” but also simplicity and cost savings.

Funeral service providers who get it are stepping up to offer discounted goods and services, and they’re thriving as a result. Take Newcomer Funeral Homes in Topeka, Kansas for example. Newcomer, where a casketed funeral costs just $4,000, saw a 10 percent increase in business in 2008. And Barton Family Funeral Service near Seattle charges just $695 for a cremation; they’ve watched their business double every year since 2005, to a point where they’re conducting around 140 funerals a month – more than some traditional funeral homes see in a year.

Practical suggestions for cutting funeral costs
Opting for cremation over burial is just one way families are reducing funeral expenses. Following are some suggestions we’ve heard for having “the best” funeral with the lowest cost:

• Let your fingers do the walking. Call around to funeral homes and ask for their price lists.
• Be wary of package pricing. Choose only the specific goods and services you want and need.
• Buy a casket from a discount supplier. The funeral home is obligated to use the casket you provide, and they can’t charge an added fee for doing so.
• Go natural. Embalming and leak-proof caskets are unnecessary expenses in most circumstances. “Green” funerals are friendly to the environment and the wallet.
• Let the funeral home conduct the burial or cremation, but hold a memorial service at home or in a peaceful outdoor setting.
• Ask friends and family to help with funeral details, from selecting a musical playlist to purchasing flowers to creating a program for guests. You’ll avoid extra charges for these services, and the funeral or memorial service will be far more personal and meaningful.

Eligibility for Burial at Sea
According to information on the U.S. Navy’s website, those who are eligible for burial at sea include “Active duty, retired, honorably discharged veterans and their family members, U.S. civilian marine personnel of Military Sealift Command, other U.S. citizens who are determined eligible by the Chief of Naval Operations because of notable service and/or other contributions to our government.”

Petty Officer 2nd Class Whit Sloane is the burial-at-sea coordinator with the Navy’s Office Of Mortuary Affairs and one of only 16 Navy morticians. According to Sloane, the Navy receives about 500 to 600 requests each year for burial at sea, and almost all of them are granted. Sloane says that while most of the requests come from Navy retirees or veterans, “we get requests from all branches of the military.”

Burial-at-Sea Requirements
Families must meet specific requirements for a burial at sea, and while the Navy doesn’t charge for its services, families are responsible for any related costs, including expenses related to preparation of the body and transportation. If the deceased is to be buried in a casket, for example, the remains must be prepared by a funeral home, and the casket must be made of metal, with 150 pounds of weight added to the foot of the casket to ensure it sinks feet-first to the ocean floor. The remains must then be transported to Norfolk, Virginia or San Diego, California, the only Navy ports from which burials at sea are conducted.

Because the burial ceremony is held on a naval vessel while deployed on official maneuvers, family members are not allowed onboard for the burial. The crew will typically photograph or videotape the ceremony, however, and afterward, the Navy will present the family with the flags used during the ceremony, as well as the shells from the rounds fired during the salute and navigational charts that mark the location of the burial.

To learn more about the burial-at-sea program, visit the Navy’s website at http://www.navy.mil/navydata/questions/burial.html.

Even as cremation gains popular acceptance as a solution to the problem of cemetery overcrowding and the harsh environmental impacts inherent in traditional burial, some say cremation doesn’t go far enough to mitigate environmental concerns.

Among the latter is an Australian engineering company that hopes to import and employ a technology known as resomation. The process uses chemicals at high temperatures to dissolve human bodies, yielding liquid remains that could be used as fertilizer, as well as a dry bone residue that could be kept in a cremation urn.

Handmade Biodegradable Box Cremation Urn

Resomation uses less energy than cremation while eliminating the need to dedicate more and more land space to burials. In resomation, bodies are dissolved in lye in stainless steel cylinders comparable to pressure cookers. Although the technology is not yet in widespread use, two U.S. universities are using resomation to dispose of cadavers donated for medical research.

In 2008, the New South Wales Department of Lands released a discussion paper on sustainable disposal of corpses, detailing the plight of Sydney’s eight Crown land cemeteries, all of which are expected to be full by 2035.

Cremation is cited in the paper as one way to ease the pressure on cemeteries; however, concerns have been raised that the release of pollutants, such as mercury from dental fillings, makes cremation a less sustainable option than many think. Proponents of resomation say the technology’s big advantage is that it relies less on fossil fuels than either burial or cremation.

Resomation rapidly decomposes bodies in a solution of water and potassium hydroxide heated to 150°C (302°F). Although the process was developed in the United States, it is not yet legal in most states; nor is it legal in the UK.

Enter Resomation Ltd, a Glasgow company that has entered into discussions with more than a dozen local authorities that are desperate to find new ways of handling their dead and interested in learning more about resomation. Because no local authority can approve resomation until the process is legalized by the national Government, however, Resomation Ltd is also lobbying members of the House of Commons.

A report in The Independent, citing an acknowledgment by justice minister Bridget Prentice, suggests those efforts might be getting somewhere. “We are… aware of the growing interest in resomation as an alternative method of disposal. In view of this interest we are giving consideration to the representations that have already been made to us and are exploring how best to engage more widely on this issue,” says Prentice.

New Solutions, Not-so-New Problem
Seven years ago, a report from the House of Commons environment committee expressed alarm about the “sheer magnitude of the problems facing our cemeteries” and called the Government’s handling of the crisis “inexcusable.” Today, experts say that half the graveyards in Greater London are already full, and the remaining capacity is being used up at the rate of 10,000 interments per year. Even with two bodies buried in each grave, the remaining space will run out quickly.

Proponents claim that legalizing resomation will not only help to alleviate the space problem, but also provide a more environmentally friendly alternative to cremation.

The latter was the case for Kristy Davis and her dad. When Kristy’s terminally ill mother was discharged from the hospital and admitted to home hospice care, Kristy and her dad responded to the emotionally charged situation by staying busy. When the going got tough, they went shopping.

Shopping for an answer
Kristy’s dad purchased and upgraded gadgets and systems around the house to provide comfort and make life easier for his wife and her caregivers. When Kristy was besieged by feelings of sadness and helplessness over her mother’s suffering, she set up a laptop at her mom’s beside, “just in case she wanted to do any typing.”

In the days following her mother’s death, Kristy and her dad jumped into action planning the funeral. They purchased and configured components for their computer and sound systems, as well as an LCD projector to show the PowerPoint presentation created by Kristy’s sister for the funeral.

Even after the funeral, the shopping spree continued. Eventually Kristy realized that the buying and busy-ness were merely ways to avoid confronting the tremendous loss she and her father shared. When the money for electronic toys ran out, Kristy and her dad were forced to find another way to bond.

What now?
Their conversations were awkward, but they spent time together on long drives and over meals. Eventually they began to communicate via email, and they talked about the sorrow and loss they shared. Kristy’s dad, a retired Air Force colonel, was even able to tell his daughter of his enduring and unconditional love for her for the very first time.

The experience of Kristy and her dad isn’t unique – grief is hard work, and humans often rely on one or more defense mechanisms to help them get through. But in the end, as Kristy and her dad discovered, the only way out of grief is to go through it, and sharing helps to light the way.