Building senior housing in the cemetery

Here in Toronto a number of old churches have torn down most of their building, and built a senior's home in it's place, leaving a small part of the original building as a place to pray. In one case at St Hilda's , the new building is a ten floor senior's apartment building, designed as single small suites, with a main floor dinning room, activity areas, a medical clinic, and a small indoor shallow swimming pool. The individual units have a 500 sq foot area, with living room, bedroom , and bathroom. The cost is about $900 a month, all including meals and medical care. The old church building is now only the original entrance way and the big wooden doors. The church members hold Sunday services in the activity room, in the new building. Some other churches with declining memberships have sold their buildings to be made over as condominium apartment buildings, and split the money received between their long time members. In some cases the sale might bring in 5 or 7 million dollars based on the value of the land , in the biggest city in the country. JimB.
 
Here in Toronto a number of old churches have torn down most of their building, and built a senior's home in it's place, leaving a small part of the original building as a place to pray. In one case at St Hilda's , the new building is a ten floor senior's apartment building, designed as single small suites, with a main floor dinning room, activity areas, a medical clinic, and a small indoor shallow swimming pool. The individual units have a 500 sq foot area, with living room, bedroom , and bathroom. The cost is about $900 a month, all including meals and medical care. The old church building is now only the original entrance way and the big wooden doors. The church members hold Sunday services in the activity room, in the new building. Some other churches with declining memberships have sold their buildings to be made over as condominium apartment buildings, and split the money received between their long time members. In some cases the sale might bring in 5 or 7 million dollars based on the value of the land , in the biggest city in the country. JimB.
Wow, Jim, a place similar to that where I live would be about $3,000/month but without health care. :(
 
Wow, Jim, a place similar to that where I live would be about $3,000/month but without health care. :(
Remember that here in Canada, everyone who is either a Canadian citizen or a Permanent Resident is covered by the Provincial health care system. Of course that includes seniors . So the nurses and the Doctors who provide the care at St Hilda's tower are paid by OHIP. The operational costs at such a senior's residence are partly paid by the Province, and also by the rent paid by the residents who live there. The cost of building the tower was shared by the Provincial Government and the Anglican church of Canada. JImB.
 
In Pgh I worked at a hospital that was right next door to a cemetery. See it right out the windows. Many old graves and monuments, but still open and active. It it was also a very friendly place, very well maintained, and the part still “open “ was very far back from the main entrances and older part. Lots of people me included used used to take lunch time walks there, a few even ate their sandwiches on their family plot.
In a way I always thought it would be kind of comforting to have people around. Behaving respectfully of course.
 
I often drive by a cemetery in my town. Back when this town was started, it would have been considered out of the way. But you know how that goes, towns spread. I can see houses that are much older than the ones around them. At one time they must have had much more land. But the land got sold and houses built on it. Back on point, I don't really think of the cemetery.

When I lived in Olympia Washington, St. Peter's hospital was several stories high and some of the rooms viewed a cemetery. I remember thinking that wasn't great.

High separating retaining wall perhaps? No other land?
 
Your avatar is an ad for Invisalign San Antonio Cosmetic Dentistry. What's up with that @SamuelJeremy?
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A few years ago, the local nabobs were considering taking a large area that was unused in the cemetery and building a senior housing facility on it. I asked one of the town board members if the developers were sending a subliminal message.
The cemetery business is as crooked as any other business.

A few decades back, I used to walk with my half dozen mutts through what is called a Forest Preserve. This Preserver was in a suburb right outside of Chicago.

One day, our long walk along a river bank brought us to a cemetery which was up on a hill about a ten or fifteen higher than the river bank. What I saw in the muddy clay of the river bank were dozens of tombstones thrown about helter skelter. The dates on some were from the late 1800s through some dated only about a decade before.

I knew immediately that the cemetary owners had dumped them to resell the grave sites to new customers. I knew better than go to any local politician or "enforcement" group. Those people had already proven to me what they were and weren't. What they weren't was trustworthy.

Instead, I phoned the news department of a local television station. They seemed very interested in the story. However, after some days went by and I never heard from them or saw the story on their station during their prime time news, I called them back. What I got in return was hokum bukum excuses.

A further fact, I had remembered a few of the names on the tombstones. After finding a few of the surnames in the local phone book, I called the numbers and found that indeed two of the people called were indeed relatives of the deceased.

Now, to shorten the story, I found later that these two families had gotten together and had spoken with some "Community Leader" or other.

Well, I was invited to a meeting among not just the two couples I had disclosed the problem to, but quite a few other families who had also visited the site I had found. None of them could find the graves of their dead relatives, but they did find their tombstones exactly were I had said they were. Long story short, no legal action was to be taken because they cemetary had made a $$$ deal with the families.

Quite a number of days later, I again visited that river bank and the tombstones were gone, and when I scouted around the cemetary itself, I could not find any grave of any of those deceased.

That told me that those "loving" relatives were simply out for the $$$ and little else. Plus, I never heard the incident reported on the news of the television station to whom I had given the story. I was left with the solid suspicion that the cemetary was politically connected and bought off more than just the families of the deceased.

Lessons learned throughout life are numerous, and most of them we can learn to accept and move on, but this complete rejection of the worth of those deceased by their families is of such perfidy it lives with me to this day.
 
I pay for perpetual care for my parents' lot, but when I visit, it's often overgrown. I think the grass is only cut just before Memorial day when they think the most people will be visiting and they don't trim in between headstones. The last time I was there, it looked like a large tree toppled over in a nearby lot. It had broken many headstones. Nothing has been done to remove it or restore the monuments.
 


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