Countywide : Sale of a District Cemetery Approved

The Orange County Board of Supervisors Tuesday approved the sale of the 120-year-old Magnolia Memorial Park Cemetery in Garden Grove to a private company for $31,000.

The six-acre cemetery, which belonged to the Orange County Cemetery District, was sold to the Omega Society Inc. of Santa Ana. District officials say the transaction was likely the first sale of a public cemetery in California history.

The trustees of the cemetery district recommended selling the parcel to help offset state revenue losses that are expected to total $700,000 by the end of the year. The losses have forced the agency to reduce its staff and contract work for landscaping and maintenance.

“I really think it was in the best interest of everyone involved,” said district General Manager Sam Randall. “It was a prudent decision for the board of trustees and showed real foresight and concern by the board to concur with it.”

Several county residents with relatives buried in the cemetery spoke at a public hearing before the board’s 4-0 vote and expressed concern that a new owner might not maintain the cemetery grounds as well as the district has.

An Omega representative told the board and the speakers that the terms of the sale required that the company keep the cemetery up to district standards.

Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder said the sale made good business sense.

“Change doesn’t come easily . . . (but) this will reduce the size and expense of government,” she said. “The direction of the future is privatization.”

Randall agreed.

“Privatization is a sensitive issue and if it happens to be a cemetery it can be even more sensitive,” he said.

Magnolia Cemetery, with 3,800 plots, is the smallest of the districts four cemeteries. There is room at the cemetery for about 1,000 additional plots.

In other action Tuesday, the board agreed to spend $255,000 to extend for six months a program that resulted in removal of 237,000 square feet of graffiti since July.

Board members contributed $255,000 to start the graffiti abatement program last year and decided to fund it for another six months after reviewing the program’s initial success.

Last July, the county had 327,000 square feet of graffiti to be removed, county officials said. The graffiti is now down to 90,000 square feet, and all of it should be gone by the end of the month, the board was told by officials from the county’s Environmental Management Agency.