Waukesha County cemetery clears personal items off gravesites, gets backlash
WAUKESHA COUNTY, Wis. - They went to pay respects to their loved ones and discovered the Waukesha County cemetery cleared personal items off the gravesites.
When Lezlie Esenther came to visit her father’s grave at The Gardens of StoneBank cemetery, it wasn’t how she remembered.
Cemetery workers cleared crosses, flags and mementos from all plots. Esenther said a golf ball in the ground in front of her dad’s tombstone was even dug up.
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"It looks so bare. There’s no character," Esenther said. "No personality, no love. It’s so painful to see my little things taken and thrown in here."
She said all the items were put in one big pile with no warning.
It took Sally Pfeiffer three days to find all of her late husband’s stuff.
"Everything was just buried under everything," Pfeiffer said. "It’s part of our grieving – tending to these graves. It's our thing that we can do."
More than two dozen people confronted cemetery owner Christine Toson about it Monday. Toson said the items made it difficult to keep the grass cut.
"Anything that’s planted into the ground or plugged into the ground that will get in the way of our trimming – that’s really what the main problem is," Toson said.
Toson said the cemetery notified families in advance about the removals through Facebook and email. She said the cemetery’s policies haven’t changed in the last 17 years, they just haven’t been enforced.
Most people said they never got the message.
Toson said others have complained about the clutter, and prefer a quote "cleaner-looking" cemetery.
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But that’s not enough for some of these families. They said they want increased communication from the cemetery and they say an apology would also help.
Esenther never found her dad’s golf ball and is still looking for answers.
"It’s not your property. It’s not yours, it’s mine," Esenther said. "You took it and you lost it."
The cemetery’s owner said she’ll consider a proposal by families to establish an advisory committee of lot owners. She admitted communication on this issue could have been better.