LAWRENCE — Early this spring, a grieving woman arrived at Bellevue Cemetery with wooden forms and concrete. She proceeded to pour her own monument for her loved one at the historic May Street burial ground.
Other mourners have brought in candles, bouquets of plastic flowers, fencing, large stuffed animals, bushes, makeshift memorials and other items that aren't allowed in the cemetery.
Normally, workers would go around twice a year removing the items, which cemetery officials said become obstacles and dangers during lawn mowing. But this year, due to budget cuts, plot owners, their relatives and friends, are being advised to clean up the grave sites themselves.
They have until Sept. 30 to clear the "debris, makeshift memorials and obstructions around the headstones and grave lots before winter sets in," said Thomas Ferris Jr., Bellevue Cemetery superintendent.
"I understand and I try to be sympathetic, but some of this stuff is really hard to get around," said Ferris during a tour of the cemetery this week.
Some of the makeshift memorials extend 2 to 3 feet beyond headstones and are fenced in, he said, making the rows between the graves impassable for lawn mowers.
Lit candles at the grave sites are a danger during dry weather. Plastic flowers and stuffed animals easily become projectiles if they are hit by a lawn mower or weed wacker, Ferris said.
Some of the displays "are getting bigger and bigger. We have to get that stuff out of there," he said.
Also, the makeshift memorials and decorations are prohibited by cemetery rules, which were originally adopted in the 1890s. Visitors can leave small potted flowers and plants around the headstones.
But items such as curbing, fencing, concrete and marble chips are prohibited, said Elizabeth Charlton, a Bellevue Cemetery board member.
Measuring roughly 110 acres, Bellevue Cemetery is steep in many spots. There also are many trees there, making maintenance difficult.
"It's a very diversified topography," said Mary Lou Boddy, a veteran Bellevue board member.
Keeping up the cemetery in years past was easier when five workers were assigned there. When Ferris was hired as superintendent in October 2008, he had three workers. But on July 1, when citywide budget cuts went into effect, Ferris lost another worker.
Ferris said he's well aware every department is doing more with less.
"Having two workers to take care of a 110-acre cemetery is tough," Ferris said. "If I had five guys, I could go gangbusters. I would get a lot of work done."
Included on the National Register of Historic Places, the cemetery gets many visits from history buffs. They are often interested in the grave of Sumner Needham, who died in 1862, the city's first casualty of the Civil War. Daniel Saunders, the city's founder who died in 1872, and his family also are buried in the older section of the cemetery.
Keeping up the older section of the cemetery proves to be a challenge. Many areas are overgrown by Japanese bamboo, knotweed, sumac and bittersweet vine, said Ferris, a state-certified arborist.
Ferris has received help from work crews of county inmates, Scouting groups and other volunteers.
"When I do get an influx of labor, I send them over here," said Ferris, of the older portion of the cemetery.
A former state highway worker, Ferris said he took the cemetery job in Lawrence because he wanted to improve the cemetery.
"People's loved ones are buried in here. I felt bad the place was in the condition it was in," he said.
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