Work to expand Castledaly Graveyard is to commence in the coming weeks, councillors learned this week, after they raised concern about the lack of space in both Castledaly and Dunegan graveyards.
Lack of space had become such a problem in Castledaly that a local man recently volunteered to give up his own plot to accommodate the sudden death of a local person.
“There was a sudden death recently and someone who already had their grave bought offered to give up his space. I understand that was the last one,” said Cllr John Dolan.
“Space is running out in both graveyards, particularly Castledaly. We did make more space available but it has been used and we are back to square one,” he added.
Cllr Frankie Keena said the extension of the graveyards had been on the agenda for the past five years, though he praised the council for recent developments at Castledaly including the purchase of additional land and fencing off of an area for new graves.
The council’s director of services Hugh O’Reilly exlained that there is a full plan in place for both graveyards, both of which involve “significant works”, and that phase one of works at the Castledaly would commence in the next few weeks.
“The council has put funding in place for phase one of both projects, which include additional space to last a number of years. There are later phases which include things like additional car parking that we do not have funding for now,” he explained.
While Cllr Dolan suggested that funding could be raised by selling plots, Mr O’Reilly said the council’s policy was generally not to sell graces in advance of need, but he agreed that anyone who had given up their plot recently would be facilitated.
