BANFF – If you were born in Banff you can now be buried in Banff.
Council last week directed administration to bring back amendments to the municipality’s cemeteries bylaw, including new eligibility criteria for burial or inurnment in the national park townsite.
Up until now, a person needed to be a permanent resident of Banff National Park at the time of death, or the immediate next of kin of someone whose remains are interred in the cemetery.
However, new proposals would extend the criteria to include those born in Banff. It would also include a permanent resident of Banff National Park – as opposed to any national park – and change the cumulative period they’ve lived here from 25 to 15 years.
Nadine Setzer, the Town of Banff’s manager of municipal services, said the changes address issues that have been raised.
“Let’s say your children go off to university, they grew up in this community, they have no other family interred at the cemetery and they hadn’t lived here for 25 years, if it was your child, they wouldn’t meet the criteria to be interred within our cemeteries,” she said, referencing the change from 25 to 15 years.
Council supported the proposed changes, which will be included in bylaw amendments to be brought back to council at a future date for a final decision.
“Twenty-five years is a long time, and I think 15 years, whether childhood or adulthood, shows a contribution to this community,” said Councillor Corrie DiManno.
There’s also a proposal to change the next of kin definition to include grandparents and grandchildren.
“Often we see families come and the grandchildren want to come back and use their family plot, but they can’t because their parents have been interred elsewhere and so they currently don’t qualify,” said Setzer.
In 2012, council approved construction of a columbarium, an ossuary and memorial wall, which was scheduled for development in 2017.
Administration later proposed to develop a scattering garden rather than an ossuary, which council supported in 2015.
With the approved development of the columbarium project, which now includes the creation of a scattering garden and memorial wall, administration evaluated the cemeteries bylaw and discussed the changes with council in a two-day workshop last summer.
Under the proposals, any person would qualify to be scattered at the garden and anyone would qualify to be memorialized on the Banff Cemetery memorial wall, no interment necessary.
