On the face of it, the squabble between the Hilldale Cemetery Association in Haverhill and Mayor James Fiorentini might look like it is over no more than a relatively small amount of money — $800.
But it's not just about a one-time expenditure. It is about setting precedent, which could leave the city on the hook for vastly more than $800.
Thomas Spitalere, president of the cemetery board, contends that Fiorentini promised that the city would help erect a fence between the Hilldale property and the adjacent city burial ground known as the paupers cemetery. The board has purchased the fence, but wants the city to pay the $800 it will cost to install it.
The fence is needed, according to the board, because vandals are coming into Hilldale from the city cemetery at night, dumping material or damaging the property.
Fiorentini counters that the only promise he made was that the city would do what it could to help the board, and has done so by increasing police patrols in the area and by doing measurements to determine how much fence would be needed. The city cannot afford anything else, he said, especially with another impending round of cuts in state aid.
Spitalere is now threatening to produce evidence that the vandals are coming into Hilldale from the public cemetery, and to sue the city for the expense of repairing the damage and cleaning up the debris.
But that would produce little more than legal expenses and ill will. Spitalere and his fellow board members would do much better to seek donations for the $800 and erect the fence themselves.
It may be true that vandals are coming into Hilldale from the city cemetery. But vandals, thieves, burglars and others come onto private property all the time from public property. The city does not have a duty, or a legal obligation, to fence off all public property.
And, as Fiorentini has noted, if the city pays to erect a fence here, it could find itself facing demands from other private cemeteries to do the same thing.
The city is not responsible for this fence. It would be fiscally irresponsible for the mayor to agree to pay for it.
