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Blog Entry 45 of 80 Grave Concerns: Inside Grand View Memorial Park

News you can use regarding Grand View Memorial Park, Glendale, CA's oldest cemetery, which has been closed for regular business since June 13, 2006, due to legal and financial problems. Lisa Burks also runs the website GrandViewMemorialPark.info.

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Garcin dual disinterment slated for May 1

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Contributed by: Lisa Burks on 4/27/2007

"It doesn't please me," former Glendale mayor Bob Garcin said yesterday as he told me about his decision to remove the cremated remains of his father and stepmother from Grand View Memorial Park.

"I'm thankful that they are in urns and not caskets," he added. "I don't know if I'd be doing a disinterment if it was a casket. I don't think I could go through that."

"I was in the Navy when my father passed away, and that's when my stepmother got the spots there," said Bob, who served on Glendale's city council from 1975 to 1983, including two separate terms as mayor.

Edwin Thomas Garcin died on May 20, 1954 and Lucille Norman Garcin followed him in death on January 2, 1966.

Their court-approved disinterments are scheduled for May 1.

Although many people have expressed a desire to get their loved ones' remains out of Grand View, the Garcins will be the first to actually go through the entire process since the cemetery came under a preservation order last year.

Garcin, a Carlsbad resident since 2001, once lived less than two blocks from Grand View and recalled taking flowers to his parents' sites in the Garden of Prayer over the years, when the Hepburn family owned the property, and that he thought it always looked "fine."

But last summer, just weeks before the cemetery closed for regular business on June 13, Garcin made a day trip up to Glendale which included a stop at Grand View.

"I was absolutely shocked when I walked inside there. I was shakened by what I saw. You couldn't drive in, the roads were all errupted," Bob said.

"A gal named Wells, a manager of some sort, was there," Bob further explained. "When I asked what in the world is going on, she said "Oh, well, we've got some problems.' That's when I thought, 'I better get my folks out of here!'"

A court order is required for each burial or disinterment at Grand View these days.

Garcin filed a petition in late March, and was immediately granted permission from the court to remove his parents' remains to niches at Eternal Hills Cemetery, in Oceanside, where he and his wife have purchased pre-need crypts for themselves.

"We'll all be together, we have a nice little area for everyone," said Bob, with a measure of relief in his voice. His only concern now, in light of recent news of past botched burial locations, is that his parents urns are in the spots where they are supposed to be; a question he will have answered on Tuesday.

Besides the court petition, Bob said that he also had to secure a permit from the California State Health Department for the disinterment, which he acquired at a branch office in San Diego. He as petitioner also assumes responsiblity for all costs associated with the procedure.

"I've never wanted to give up, but it's been an interesting experience" said Bob of his nearly year-long odyssey.

"I've learned a lot, and would not want to have to do it again. I feel so bad for the people with worse cases [than this one], it's shocking, just incredible," he added.

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