Reynolds to add crematory after city changes stance

Jan. 27—A proposal to build what a Decatur official referred to as an "industrial" crematorium that could have serviced multiple funeral homes was nixed, but a slimmed down version was approved this week for Reynolds Funeral Home on West Moulton Street.

Reynolds owner Dexter Elliott resubmitted the project with a promise that he wouldn't provide the service to other funeral homes.

Elliott said Wednesday he is now planning a 4,800-square-foot building with a crematorium and garage for funeral home vehicles and extra caskets on his 3.7-acre property in Northwest Decatur.

He said Parkway Funeral Home in Trinity is the only place in Morgan, Lawrence and Limestone counties with a crematory. However, Elliott said Parkway only serves its own customers and doesn't accept bodies from other funeral homes. Consequently, he said he's driving almost daily to a crematory in Huntsville to serve his customers.

Elliott said this is becoming an increasing issue for his funeral home, which is in its 94th year, because the number of cremations is increasing. He said this is a national trend that's just reaching the South and it's beginning to show up locally.

In 2020, 56% of Americans who died were cremated, more than double the figure of 27% two decades earlier, according to the Cremation Association of North America.

By 2040, 4 out of 5 Americans are projected to choose cremation over casket burial, according to both the Cremation Association and the National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA).

"We did about 20 last month when we used to only do four or five in a month," Elliott said. "There are still a lot of people who want traditional burials, but we are getting a lot of requests for cremations."

The Cremation Association estimates that 20% to 40% of cremated remains are interred in a cemetery — placed in the ground or a columbarium, a storage area for urns — while 60% to 80% are buried in another location, scattered or kept at home.

One factor that may be increasing the use of cremation is cost.

Comparisons are challenging because of the many options, but the median price of a funeral with burial and viewing is $7,848, according to the NFDA. On the other hand, the median cost of direct cremation is a third of the price at $2,550. Cremation with viewing and funeral is comparable to a traditional burial, with a median cost of $6,970.

The initial proposal Elliott submitted to the city was turned down.

Building Department Supervisor Tom Polk said Elliott's initial proposal showed a crematorium in a detached building with roll-up doors. A vehicle could pull through, drop off a body for cremation and then leave.

Polk said he did not give administrative approval because it looked like Elliott "wanted to build an industrial operation" that wouldn't fit with the neighborhood.

"His business model showed he could contract with other funeral homes," Polk said. "I was concerned that this was the first of many cremations for other funeral homes."

The funeral home on the corner of 13th Avenue Northwest and West Moulton Street is in a B-2, central business zoning district, and, while it's just off busy West Moulton Street, it is on the edge of a residential district.

In December, Elliott lost his appeal of Polk's administrative decision to the city's Board of Zoning Adjustments.

Elliott then changed his proposal to show his new building with only one incinerator. He also included a letter that says the crematory will only be used to support his funeral home and its retail business.

"They thought it was going to be a factory as opposed to a service that will support my funeral home," Elliott said. "I changed the paperwork to show that it will have a family area with a retail store that sells things like urns, jewelry and tombstones that go along with cremations."

Polk said he compared the change to a local automotive dealership having a paint area in its maintenance shop that only supports its own repair needs as opposed to a full-scale paint shop serving other businesses.

Elliott said the new building will be mostly metal with a brick facade around the bottom. It will be painted so that it matches the funeral home, he said.

There will also be additional parking that will serve the new crematorium and funeral home.

"Not a lot of folks will go into the crematorium," Elliott said. "We will have an area where the family can gather."

Elliott said he hopes his new crematorium will be ready in June, but construction is only a part of getting it ready. Along with city building inspections, the Alabama Board of Funeral Service has to inspect it and authorize the final permits.

"A crematorium is highly regulated," Elliott said. "The average person will never know there's a crematorium there because there's no emissions or smell."

There are emissions, said Ron Gore, chief of the Air Division at the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, but manufacturers of crematories install air pollution devices to limit the substances released into the air.

Gore said ADEM's regulatory supervision of crematories is minimal.

"In a few situations over the years there's been local opposition to crematories, and people think we have the resources to issue an installation permit, but we don't," he said Thursday. "They're way down there on the list of air pollution sources that we regulate, so we can't regulate them very closely."

Gore said crematories are considered small-scale incinerators. If the manufacturer of a crematory demonstrates that its product meets Environmental Protection Agency air pollution standards, that model of crematory is added to an approved list.

"There's a bunch of different vendors who manufacture those and sell them; they're not custom built on site," Gore said. "They bring it in on a skid and it's basically ready to go."

As long as a funeral home buys a unit from the approved list, ADEM has little involvement.

"All you have to do is register with ADEM and say 'I'm buying this model and promise to operate it right,' and we're through with you unless there's a complaint," he said.

ADEM has occasionally had complaints about crematories after installation.

"You have to operate them properly. They really do have air pollution equipment on them — it's basically an extra burner to burn up the smoke," Gore said. "If you don't use it properly, an incinerator can still smoke, which it shouldn't do. We handle those on a complaint basis."

— bayne.hughes@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2432. Twitter @DD_BayneHughes.