Greetings all, Please help to get legislation enacted to establish minimum standards of maintenance at cemeteries. Without letters of support, this bill may not be passed. Senator Denise Moreno Ducheny has sponsored a bill that is hoped to establish "minimum standards of maintenance" at cemeteries throughout California. The law will primarily cover licensed, privately-owned cemeteries, to help ensure that those families who have loved ones buried in a cemetery will have a minimal expectation that the cemeteries will not become eyesores either through neglect or abandonment. The text of the bill is as follows. "Bureau" refers to the Cemetery and Funeral Bureau of the Dept. of Consumer Affairs: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. Section 9611 is added to the Business and Professions Code , to read: 9611. The bureau shall disclose on its Web site information about each cemetery subject to the jurisdiction of the bureau. In addition to the information required by Section 27, the bureau shall disclose the name of the owner of each cemetery, the name of the cemetery, the business address of the cemetery owner, and the physical address of the cemetery. SEC. 2. Section 9612 is added to the Business and Professions Code , to read: 9612. Notwithstanding Section 8115 of the Health and Safety Code, the bureau shall adopt regulations that establish minimum standards of maintenance for endowment care cemeteries under the jurisdiction of the bureau. The standards shall be those reasonably necessary to protect the public health and safety, assure decent and respectful treatment of human remains, and prevent the offensive deterioration of cemetery grounds, structures, and places of interment. The regulations shall consider differences in cemetery size, location, and topography, type of interments, and the extent to which funds are available from the cemetery's endowment care funds to perform maintenance. The standards established under this section shall not supercede any standards of a higher level of care established pursuant to Section 8115 of the Health and Safety Code. If you have had a problem with maintenance, care or abandonment of a cemetery where your families are buried, please send a quick letter of support in an email to the Senate Business and Professions Committee. I have included a sample template for your use (BELOW) which you can easily include the name of the cemetery you are concerned about and cut and paste the letter into a new email to send. You will be sending the email to Erika Johnson of Senator Ducheny's office so your email will need to include a request that a copy of the email be given to the Committee members. Emails need to be sent by MONDAY, APRIL 10th. This could be an important first step to helping ensure that our California cemeteries are properly maintained so that the places where we bury our loved ones will have some modicum of dignity and respect. Thank you in advance to any of you who will take them time to support this bill. Sue Silver, State Coordinator California Saving Graves (SEE SAMPLE LETTER BELOW - Don't forget to include information shown in [brackets]. If you would like to personalize the letter, please feel free to do so!) SAMPLE LETTER ********************************************************************** Send your Email to: Erika.Johnson@SEN.CA.GOV ********************************************************************** RE: SB 1490 - SUPPORT Dear Ms. Johnson, Please forward the following correspondence to the members of the Senate Business and Professions Committee in support of SB 1490. Thank you! ********************************************************************** The Honorable Liz Figueroa, Chair Senate Business, Professions, and Economic Development State Capitol, Room 2053 Sacramento CA 95814 Re: Support for SB 1490, by Senator Denise Moreno Ducheny Dear Senator Figueroa: I, [YOUR NAME], respectfully requests your support for SB 1490, by Senator Ducheny. The Senator introduced SB 1490 in response to a request from her constituents in Imperial County, to address an issue that threatens the resting places of Californians' loved ones. Senate Bill 1490 seeks to ensure that private cemetery properties are properly maintained and that anyone who owns, sells or purchases a private cemetery property in California will be licensed with the Cemetery and Funeral Bureau (CFB). Many cemeteries in our State, like the one [OR ENTER NAME OF CEMETERY] where members of my family rest, have been ill-maintained or abandoned. While the law requires "proper maintenance", it does not establish any minimum standard for care and maintenance. Having a standard in law with no definition makes it difficult for me, and other Californians, to make sure that the appropriate care, care that we have paid for, is provided by cemetery owners. The law also doesn't require sufficient reporting of the transfer of ownership of cemeteries to assure an updated list of privately owned cemeteries. This has made it easier for owners to abandon properties and avoid their responsibility to provide ongoing maintenance, and makes it harder for the CFB to keep track of ownership as it changes over the years. Finally, the legal minimum fees for cemetery endowment care funds are not sufficient to provide for ongoing maintenance. I am told by Senator Ducheny's staff that even the CFB Auditor confirmed in their meeting that the law does not require the collection of sufficient fees to assure that properties are properly maintained. SB 1490 will provide simple solutions to these problems by increasing the CFB's ability to make sure that the intent of the law is met. It will help to ensure that cemetery properties are properly maintained by requiring the experts at CFB, by whatever process they feel is appropriate, to establish minimum standards that respect the variety of private cemeteries that exist in California. The bill would clarify and increase ownership reporting to CFB and County Recorders so that CFB can use its limited resources to better enforce our laws, rather than chasing owners across the country, in my case a New York company that has no intention of fulfilling its responsibility to my family. Finally, the bill would improve CFB's authority to make sure that endowment care funds are healthy enough to meet maintenance standards, exactly what we all think we're getting when we make arrangements for our families' resting places. Please help us protect other families from having to live with this problem in the future. When SB 1490 is heard before your committee, I ask for your "AYE" vote. Respectfully, [Your Name] [Address] [Telephone Number] [Email address] cc: Senator Bill Morrow, Vice Chair, Room 4048; Senator Samuel Aanestad, Room 2054; Senator Dean Florez, Room 5061; Senator Joe Simitian, Room 4062