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Alabama agency hoping to sell troubled cemeteries

Written by DeadGirl
Friday, 16 June 2006
By PHILLIP RAWLS Associated Press Writer June 16. 2006 The state Insurance Department hopes to start selling some of the 19 cemeteries and funeral homes it took over from an out-of-state company that was nearly $3 million behind in putting customers' money into trusts. People who purchased pre-need funeral and burial policies from the previous operator, Mike Graham and Associates, should not worry because the state is honoring the policies and the new owners will too, said Denise Azar, chief of the Insurance Department's receivership division. The state has been operating the businesses for as long as eight months. But Azar said Friday the department plans to take bids for the businesses, with 10 likely put on the market soon and the others to follow. "It's been a difficult road, but hopefully they can be sold in the future," Azar said in an interview Friday. Jerry White of Pleasant Grove said he and his wife spent $10,500 on pre-need funerals and burials in Forest Grove Memory Gardens, and despite efforts by the Insurance Department to keep the businesses operating, he worries whether the services will be available when he needs them. "If I had it to do over right now, I'd not buy it. I'd tell my wife, 'Let's put this money in a bank account and let it grow,'" he said. The Insurance Department got a court order in October to take over operation of 15 funeral homes and cemeteries from Mike Graham and Associates of Houston, Texas. In January, the department added four others Graham had operated - all in the northern half of the state. Azar said the cemeteries and funeral homes were $2.99 million behind in payments to trusts that hold the funds paid by customers who bought pre-need funeral and burial policies. When bids are sought for the businesses, the buyers will meet the trust deficit so policies can continue to be honored, she said. The department is not selling any new pre-need policies while it is operating the cemeteries and funeral homes, but it is operating the businesses with payments on current policies and purchases by families who need funerals immediately, she said. The department is also advising customers who had pre-need policies to file claim forms with the department. The forms are available on the department's Web site. The department took over the businesses through a law passed by the Legislature in 2002 to regulate the sale of pre-need policies by funeral homes and cemeteries. The Graham case is the biggest cemetery takeover ever by the department, agency spokesman Ragan Ingram said. Alabama is not alone. Some other states where the Texas company operated have also taken action. Azar said no funerals have been delayed because of the takeover, but there have been delays getting grave markers because the operator was behind on payments before the state took over. Those problems are being resolved, she said. White said his father-in-law, who had a pre-need policy when he died in August 2005, still doesn't have a marker for his burial spot in Pleasant Grove. http://www.timesdaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060616/APN/606160834&cachetime=5

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Taphophilia?

taphophilia (taf′ō-fil′ē-ă)

ORIGIN:
From the Greek words taphos, meaning "tomb" or "sepulcher" and philia, meaning "attraction or affinity to something, in particular the love or obsession with something"

DEFINITION: 1. An excessive interest in graves and cemeteries. 2. A love or fondness for funerals, graves, and cemeteries. 3. In psychiatry, a morbid attraction to graves and cemeteries

Taphophiles Speak

Have you decided on eternal repose?

	earthen burial
	entombment
	cremation
	donation to science
	cyrogenically frozen
	you mean I'm still alive?

Quote Repository

“The good he scorn'd Stalk'd off reluctant, like an ill-us'd ghost, Not to return; or if it did, its visits Like Those of angels, short, and far between.”

Robert Blair (1699-1746) from