Weíll never know what John Kottinger would have done, but heíd likely be pleased that the City Council that governs what once was his home has finally agreed to buy the public cemetery on Sunol Boulevard where he was buried in 1892.
Kottinger, who was this townshipís first Justice of the Peace and who built a barn in 1852 at 200 Ray St. (now occupied by the Milfleur gift shop), is just one of many historic and prominent people who are buried in Pleasanton Memorial Gardens, the 120-year-old cemetery that was first owned by the International Order of Odd Fellows. Although the Odd Fellows record their first burial in 1886 when they acquired the 5-acre parcel, grave markers show some burials took place even earlier.
But the Odd Fellows organization is losing members. The Pleasanton chapter disbanded several years ago and now the Livermore organization, which took over ownership of the cemetery, canít afford to maintain it. Its members worked a deal with the Pleasanton Pioneers, a group headed by developer and businessman Chris Beratlis Sr., to sell it to the city for $1 just to get the facility off its books.
Reluctantly, the City Council agreed to a transaction that will have the deed to the deteriorating cemetery transferred to municipal ownership early next month. City Councilwoman Cindy McGovern voted against the purchase, and others, including Vice Mayor Matt Sullivan, who agreed to the deal, said he is concerned with possible unknown liabilities that the city must now shoulder, including possible tainted water run-off into a nearby creek and other environmental issues.
There was really no way out for the city government as studies showed. With only 5 acres, little room for expansion and only about 400 more grave sites to be added, Memorial Gardens proved unattractive to private cemetery investors who now need hundreds of acres before earning a profit. If the cemetery was forced into bankruptcy, as the Odd Fellowsí dwindling finances showed was possible, ownership might have passed to the county or state with a judicial ruling eventually that it should be taken over by the city where itís located.
ìEven though this cemetery will need a lot of work done to it, itís still part of the history of this community and is a gateway for those coming into town on Sunol Boulevard,î Sullivan said on TV30ís ìMayors Report.î
ìMany in the community asked that the city buy this cemetery, with more than 1,400 signing petitions making that request,î he added.
For those who think Pleasanton will finally have an attractive cemetery where they and their loved ones can be buried, Beratlis and his Pioneer group expect that there will be disappointments.
First, sales of cemetery plots at Memorial Gardens have been stopped until well into next year and until a detailed mapping of the cemetery is completed, according to Laurie Tinfow, the cityís Administrative Services Director who has been given charge of the cemetery acquisition project.
ìWe plan to maintain it as a pioneer cemetery only, with no sprinkler system and letting the grass thatís there die out,î she said. ìWe will clean it up and keep it clean, and empty the trash on a regular basis, which hasnít been done, but we have no plans to turn it into a manicured cemetery. This wonít be a Forest Lawn.î
Tinfow said that although the Odd Fellows kept fairly good burial records during many of the 120 years the organization owned it, there are gaps and missing information. As part of the mapping program she will initiate, examiners will go through the cemetery, plot by plot, with poles to probe each grave siteó-or suspected grave site-óto see if thereís a coffin below. Then there will be a determination as to how many empty plots actually exist to see if burials can be resumed.
Approximately 200 plots have been sold and burial will be allowed at those sites, Tinfow said. The city plans to contract with the Catholic Funeral & Cemetery services for these funerals and records management. The organization is a nonprofit group that also handles burials at the St. Augustine Catholic Cemetery adjacent to Memorial Gardens.
ìUnfortunately, there wonít be any new sales at this time,î Tinfow said, which means non-Catholics who are also Pleasanton residents will have to look elsewhere for cemeteries and funeral services.
In acquiring the cemetery, the City Council also approved spending about $120,000 to handle safety improvements, including tree trimming and removal of hazardous trees, as well as placing benches in various parts of the cemetery. Ongoing maintenance, which will be handled by an outside contractor, is expected to cost about $25,000 a month. There will be no improvements to the asphalt roadways and broken, leaning or cracked headstones or grave markers will not be repaired or replaced at the cityís expense.
To turn Memorial Gardens into a fully landscaped cemetery, as Beratlis and the Pioneers wanted, would have cost the city $742,000, with monthly costs estimated at $75,000.
Tinfow said the cemetery was started as a non-endowment cemetery with families expected to maintain the graves of their loved ones. Only in recent years have fees for cemetery plots been raised to include maintenance by the Odd Fellows, but even those have been too low to provide sufficient funding.
The current fee for interment at Memorial Gardens is $420, a fraction of what major public cemeteries in Hayward and Lafayette charge. Tinfow said that if sales are resumed at Memorial Gardens, she would recommend higher fees with at least 15 percent of those fees dedicated to perpetual care endowments.
With at least another 400 plots identified as available, Tinfow said city staff is recommending that additional gravesites be priced at $1,800 and limited to 10 per year for full burials, and at $900 a year for burying cremated remains.
ìBased on those assumptions, plot sales would generate approximately $27,775 a year for the first 13 years and then decrease to about $15,000 a year for a total of $365,000 over the next 20 years,î Tinfow stated in her staff report. ìPerpetual care fees would generate about $4,000 a year for a total of $80,000 over 20 years.î
As for pioneer John Kottingerís slightly crumbling headstone and the more than 1,500 other identifiable markers, which include such familiar names as Neal and Busch and, more recently, Ed Kinney, it will be up to decisions by a newly-constituted City Council next year to decide if more city funds should be allocated to restoring and upgrading Memorial Gardens beyond a Pioneer level, which are the plans for now.
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