Fire ravages foreclosed Ross County cemetery
CHILLICOTHE― The smell of scorched Earth still lingers at the Floral Hills Memory Gardens after the March 6 fire.
Around 12:30 p.m., the fire started at the cemetery located at 4284 U.S. 23, said Huntington Township Board of Trustee John Cottrill. Huntington and Scioto Townships responded to the fire in the Garden of Cristus section of the cemetery.
According to a report from the Ross County Sheriff's Office, a woman was cleaning a grave when a propane tank sparked and caught the grass on fire. She reported the fire.
Ashes scatter into the wind with every step into the burned grass. The newly placed flowers at some graves highly contrast with the disintegrated flowers that didn't survive the flames. Many of the American flags melted in the heat.
Most of the granite monuments appear to be undamaged.
Former firefighter Dave Robertson has cared for the cemetery for the past ten years. He said the lawn will most likely need to be reseeded and will take time to fully recover.
Teresa Smith has several family members buried in the section of the cemetery that was affected by the fire. She found out about the fire on Facebook and came to the cemetery to see if her family's monuments were affected.
She said the stones didn't appear to be damaged, but the grass was heavily burnt around them.
Cynthia Cooper-Battle also saw the news of the fire on Facebook and visited the cemetery to see if her family was affected. None of her loved ones' graves were located in the fire-stricken area.
"I bring my granddaughters out here and we decorate four or five times a year. This is devastating. I feel like it's affected me even though my family's over on this side. You don't want to see it," Cooper-Battle said. "It just adds on to everything that's been going on here."
The fire damage has caused yet another challenge for the volunteers taking care of the property.
The cemetery owned by Ronald Downey and Joseph Miller is in foreclosure and owes almost $19,000 in back taxes, according to Ross County Treasurer Dave Jeffers. A volunteer group named Clean up Floral Hills Memory Gardens has cared for the grounds since 2013, but Robertson said he has done the majority of the caretaking in the last several years.
He used to spend hundreds of dollars per year on the care of the lawn and would often spend over 40 hours per week on yard work. He stopped caring for the lawn last summer in the hopes that it would encourage government officials to step in and care for the lawn.
Robertson said he believes the fire wouldn't have done as much damage if the lawn was properly taken care of.
More: Floral Hills cleanup set for May 11; glimmer of hope in new law
Cottrill said the Huntington trustees were asked to take over care for the cemetery years ago, but it was "not financially feasible for us to do that" and would cost thousands of dollars per year.
Megan Becker is a reporter for the Chillicothe Gazette. Call her at 740-349-1106, email her at mbecker@gannett.com or follow her on Twitter @BeckerReporting
This article originally appeared on Chillicothe Gazette: Fire ravages foreclosed Ross County cemetery
