MEMBER of Parliament for West Central St Catherine Christopher Tufton has committed to collaborating with Meadowrest Memorial Gardens (MMG) in carrying out a three-pronged approach to resolving the dispute with the Green Acres housing scheme over the expansion of Meadowrest’s graveyard which borders the community.

A little over a week ago, the Jamaica Observer reported that residents of the Green Acres community in St Catherine wrote a letter to Daryl Vaz, minister without portfolio with responsibility for land and environment, requesting his intervention in the proposed expansion.

In its letter, the Green Acres Citizens Association chastised Meadowrest for failing to carry out its promise for a tour to assess first-hand the potential impact on their community, which falls within a one-kilometre radius of the burial ground.

According to the citizens association, residents remain perturbed about the expansion, citing fears that it could contaminate the community’s groundwater resource, drive property values down, increase flooding, and worsen noise and dust pollution from periodic blasting and the operation of heavy equipment.

Green Acres’ outcry was answered last week when the citizens, along with Tufton, were invited to a sit down with the chairman of MMG, Stefan Wright, and chief executive officer of the United Church Mission Enterprise, Ingrid Chambers, to discuss practical solutions to the matter.

“Three things have to be examined to satisfy the residents and we are going to have to deal with those. Some of it is aesthetics; not all of it is technical. Secondly, we have to deal with the inconvenience issues, especially on a Saturday or Sunday, which I’ve had to deal with going into the constituency with long lines of traffic.

“And thirdly, the cultural reality which I believe all of us can relate to, that people don’t want a funeral ground around their houses and the more visible it is, the more they feel they have invested in homes that are deteriorating. None of us would want it, frankly speaking,” Tufton said.

Tufton has committed to meeting with the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) in establishing standards on par with the global cemetery industry. Tufton also wants to enter discussions with Minister of State in the Office of the Prime Minister with responsibility for Works, Everald Warmington, on the condition of the roads leading to Meadowrest and Dovecot, which also submitted a request to NEPA last year for the expansion of its facility to cover 71 acres.

“I’m going to do my own research and look at some of the international best practices and I’m going to use that report to lobby, cooperate or collaborate with the facilities in the constituency to become the standards by which all others should be judged. That includes the relationship with the community that is mutually respectful and acceptable,” Tufton charged.

In committing to a tour of the community on February 16 or March 2, Chambers noted that the United Church Mission Enterprise, which oversees the operation of Meadowrest, is in dialogue with a civil engineer from WesTech Engineering to assess whether the expansion will require the company to develop a storm water plan for the community.

“With respect to the water table, I have done the research of the international standards of the distance of the graves from the underground water source and we are well above international standards,” Chambers argued.

According to Chambers, requirements from the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States require a maximum of 250 metres from any well, borehole or spring supplying water for human consumption or used in food production.

The Green Acres pumping well falls within a 2.5-kilometre radius of the cemetery. NEPA, in its environmental impact assessment, reported that the most significant impact of the expansion could be to groundwater resources. It, however, noted that the practice of sealing vaults, as will be carried out by Meadowrest, offers protection from the potential impact.

Still, the residents are not convinced. The citizens association reasoned that studies conducted by a geologist contracted by the community raised concerns that the community may still be at risk in the event of natural disasters like earthquakes or hurricanes.

In addition to the request for more evidence to support the view that Green Acres groundwater resource will not be contaminated, the community has also requested a 200-foot long wall with height of at least 12 to 15 feet between the cemetery and the housing scheme to minimise the visibility of the graves.

“As to the wall, we have thought long and hard about it but have not made a decision on it as yet because we are looking at how much this will cost. We have to talk frankly about the cost of building such a wall,” Wright told the meeting.

Last year Meadowrest submitted an application to NEPA for a 7.3-hectare (19-acre) expansion of the cemetery, noting that there is an urgent need for expansion given the present demand of approximately 2,000 interments annually from Kingston, St Andrew, and St Catherine.

The company, which reached a record level of burials in 2017, wants to increase the western end of its operation to approximately 19.8 hectares (49 acres) from the existing 12.15 hectares (30 acres), for the construction of an average of 1,000 single vaults and 1,500 double vaults annually.

The development of Meadowrest’s site, which also has communities such as Frenchman’s Cove, St John’s Heights and Fraser’s Content as neighbours, is slated to take place over the next four years, with an estimated lifespan of 43 years.