Worlds largest tax-funded site of mass graves might be turned

into a park
america.aljazeera.com/articles/2016/1/20/city-discusses-turning-hart-island-into-a-park.html

Rosalee Grable visited her mother's grave on Dec. 6, 2015.

Vaughn Wallace / Al Jazeera America

Grable had hoped to bury her mother in Michigan, where she grew up. But it would cost $1,000 to open the grave,
$1,000 to close it and $1,800 to engrave the name, she said. So her mother received a city burial, just like the more
than 1 million others buried since 1868 on the island, o New Yorks Bronx borough. Hart Island is run by the
Department of Correction (DOC), using inmates from the nearby Rikers Island jail complex who are paid a small
wage to bury the dead. The public may visit a gazebo on the island only once a month, and relatives of the
deceased may visit burial areas once a month under the supervision of an armed corrections ocer.

New York City Council member Elizabeth Crowley, who has introduced a draft bill to transfer jurisdiction of the island
from the DOC to the Department of Parks and Recreation, said Wednesday that DOC personnel arent trained to
manage a massive grave site and lack the necessary expertise to update burial practices that date back to the
19th century.

In transferring the island over the parks department we could look at exploring and making reforms to the burial
process reforms that include reducing the size of mass graves so that they can be closed more quickly, using
plantings to mark where the graves are and taking necessary measures to prevent soil erosion, she said.

Melinda Hunt, founder of The Hart Island Project, a nonprot organization dedicated to the conservation of Hart
Island's history, said the islands landscape needs to be stabilized so graves dont collapse or erode.

After decades of neglect, Hart Island must be made safe, Hunt said Wednesday at the council hearing. Each time a
big storm hits the island, she said, human bones are exposed along the eroding shoreline.

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Relatives of the dead have also expressed concerns about the heavy equipment used to dig graves and close
trenches, where about 1,500 people out of 50,000 who die in the city are buried each year. The weight of the
machines has caused some of the graves to collapse, Hunt said.

She also said shed like the city to oer a more hospitable welcome to those who come to mourn loved ones. Prison
guards, the conscation of cellphones and industrial-scale burials intimidate visitors, she said.

One day last year, Grable was turned away from Hart Island because she forgot to register with the DOC. It was
one of the hardest moments in my life, she said.

But the parks department opposes the islands transfer from the DOC's jurisdiction to its own, saying it lacks the
expertise and funds to manage an active burial site.

In July 2015, the DOC started allowing monthly visits to the gravesites as a result of a class-action lawsuit brought
by relatives and the New York Civil Liberties Union.

As activists push for more, ocers continue to ferry people to the island.

City burials people dont understand what they really are. Its not glamorous, but its as respectful as they can
do, a DOC ocer said the day Grable visited.

But repairs are necessary, he said to a nearby colleague, pointing out a hole in a gazebo near the graves. Next
time were here we need a couple of hammers for these nails, he said.

"The Department of Correction has administered the city cemetery on Hart Island for more than a century and
considers this a solemn responsibility," Je Jacomowitz, a DOC spokesman, told Al Jazeera in a email. "For many
years, the department conducted regular monthly visits to enable families and the public to pay their respects at a
memorial area on the island, separate from the gravesites."

After the class-action lawsuit was settled in July, allowing monthly family visits to the gravesites, Grable felt
condent more would change. As long as the spotlight has been on these guys, theyve moved mountains, she
said.

On a visit to her mothers grave in December, she carried a bouquet of fresh, light and dark pink roses like the
owers she bought for her mother on Valentines Day about a month before her death and positioned them
between four rocks on the spot where her mother was buried. Rain had washed away the plastic rose she brought
on a previous visit, in August, an ocer said. The owers fell on the muddy ground.

There needs to be grass, she said.

Wearing a secondhand jacket and pink scarf, matching the color of the roses she brought, Grable said she wanted
to join her mother and be buried there herself.

Hart Islands my family, she said. Ill be real lucky if I get all the way here.

Vaughn Wallace contributed reporting.

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