Cemetery supporters to petition on Halloween

The Spangle Cemetery overlooks the small town nestled among the rolling hills of the Palouse. It has served community members for more than a century, a monument to the people who spent their lives and created families in Spangle.

But not everyone who lives in Spangle is within the boundaries of the cemetery district. Residents in the district pay taxes that go toward the upkeep of the cemetery, including cleanup from vandals and stormy weather, mowing the grass and keeping the leaves and other yard debris off the headstones.

“We don’t know why,” said Eleanor Hill, the secretary/treasurer of the Spangle Cemetery District, who doesn’t exactly know why certain patches of the city aren’t included in the district. Over the years, records haven’t been kept very well. Hill said that many of the board’s meeting minutes have been written in pencil that has faded on school notebooks or on the backs of envelopes.

Hill is looking to change the boundary. Around 167 residents in the downtown area are not included in the district. On the evening of Halloween, she and another volunteer, Roxie Cornmesser, will go door-to-door asking residents to sign a petition to become part of the district. Hill said they need 60 percent of registered voters to sign the petition to become part of the district, but she said the two are aiming for 75 percent.

“We’re pretty frantically looking for ways to increase revenue,” Hill said.

The tax homeowners can be expected to pay is 11.5 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value. Someone who owns a home valued at $100,000 can expect to pay $11.50 a year to be part of the district.

Hill said the district receives around $6,000 a year from taxes, but the expenses to maintain the cemetery have risen to about $10,000 a year. The organization does receive memorial funds from families to maintain plots and keep fresh flowers on the graves, but keeping the cemetery in shape is becoming costly.

“The locals come out with Bobcats,” Hill said of community volunteers who generally come the Saturday before Memorial Day to clean up after the winter snows. “But we still need a steady stream of income.”

Living in the district does have its advantages, Hill said. Residents living within the district can expect to pay $1,600 for a family lot, which includes eight plots. Those who don’t live in the district must pay $3,200 for the same size family lot. Individual lots are $200 for residents within the district and $400 for nonresidents.

Hill said she and Cornmesser decided to go out on Halloween because she figures many people will be home that evening. She plans to give voters an information sheet that contains exactly how much people will pay and why.