New Philadelphia, Ohio (WJER) - City officials are set to begin constructing their new cemetery on the east side of town. 

Mayor Joel Day says the state auditor recently approved the city access to their cemetery endowment fund, which has about $257,000 available for improvements. Day says the work will be broke into three phases, starting with relocating the cemetery office from the East Avenue cemetery to the new cemetery on Delaware Drive.

“At the new cemetery land we’ll build an office building there because the architect’s plan calls for taking down the existing office building and using that area to create a beautiful memorial garden,” he says.

Day says the reorganization will allow them to create more space at their three existing cemeteries while also adding more room with their new land.

“There would be I would say at least a hundred in-ground burials, six to eight columbariums that will hold 50 to 100 niches for cremations,” he says.

Day says they’ve hired a designer to figure out how to best layout the new cemetery. he says they are taking note of the growing number of people turning to cremation to make that option more available in the city.

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