Cedar Cemetery on Four Mile Block is one of the three cemeteries in Clark Township that will benefit from a perpetual care fund set up for beautification and improvements. Residents can donate to the cemetery fund by contacting the Clark Township office. Mike Miller wants to make sure cemeteries in Clark Township look good. He knows that it can be an emotional experience visiting a lost loved one and wants to make that journey as pleasant as possible by having well kept cemeteries. That is why he sought approval from the township board of trustees to set up a separate fund for perpetual care of the three cemeteries in Clark Township.

Mr. Miller, the township clerk, pitched the idea to his fellow board members at their Thursday, September 17, meeting, gaining unanimous approval to create a cemetery fund within the township's general fund.

"In looking at the other funds, they have these isolated funds where people can donate to directly. There was not option for the cemeteries except to donate to the general fund," which if not used by the end of the township's fiscal year would be absorbed into the general fund, he said. "There was no way to earmark that money."

The fund will be used specifically for improvements at Cemetery on Four Mile Block, Italian Cemetery on St. Ignace Road, and Fenlon Cemetery on Chard Road, including planting trees, repairs to cemetery structures, and possibly building a mausoleum someday, Mr. Miller said. The fund will not be used for the general maintenance of the cemeteries, such as lawn cutting. Money in the fund will carry over from budget year to budget year, and can be designated for a specific cemetery.

A cemetery committee could also be formed to facilitate fundraisers for the fund.

Since taking office as township clerk in November, Mr. Miller has completed several cemetery projects. In April he instituted rate increases for plots in the township's three cemeteries, and in July he organized an effort to have the gazebo roof at Cedar Cemetery reshingled. Plot rates increased from $170 to $250 for a single plot and $400 for non-residents; from $325 to $425 for two plots and $600 for non-residents, and from $600 to $850 for five plots and $1,200 for non-residents. The clerk's office is responsible for maintaining the three cemeteries, Clark Township Community Center, sewer billing, and administering the townships' fire and ambulance services.

Mr. Miller's next project concerning the cemeteries is to organize burial records on the township computer server. He said some of the older records from the early 1900s are out of order and don't always match plots in the cemeteries, particularly in portions of the Fenlon and Italian cemeteries. He said some of the older records are so disorganized that plots in the northwest and southeast section of Italian Cemetery are no longer up for sale.

"We basically just closed it off to more graves because it's not in good enough shape to say someone's not buried there," he said. "There's a lot of unknowns, so rather than take a chance we've closed those sections off."

Mr. Miller said his office will take on the task of entering burial records digitally during the winter when no new graves are dug. Unless weather permits it, there are typically no burials at the any of the cemeteries between November and March. He said the task will be a challenge.

"It gets hard if you don't have a good paper trail," he said. "Some things have not been kept as well as they should have been."