Towns throughout the state are facing budget crunches. But in Coos County, Northumberland residents not only need to take care of the living, they have to take care of the dead.
The Connecticut River is eroding the ground of an old cemetery.
NHPR correspondent Chris Jensen has the story.
In 1833 when 43-year-old Colonel John Lucas was buried here, his family might have found some solace in the lovely location.
The cemetery is surrounded by mountains and the Connecticut River.
It is still a tranquil place.
But now, some Northumberland residents worry that the final resting place of friends and family will not be so final after all.
The land in which they rest is threatened.
“The river, unfortunately, has decided to try and take over it.”
That’s Terri Charron, who is on the town’s cemetery committee.
The river has been grinding away at the cemetery for decades.
The banks are steep, trees have tumbled down in places, and an estimated 40 feet of embankment has been lost.
The graves of a husband and wife were hastily moved a few years ago after part of the embankment collapsed.
Last March Northumberland voters approved spending up to $30,000 to move eight more graves to another part of the cemetery.
Charron says that will happen later this year, and it’s a difficult process.
Charron: “Lots of TLC. First we dig the new lots in the new section. That can be done by backhoe. All the digging on these lots has to be done by hand.”
Charron says the families of those buried here understand the relocation,.
“They are actually pretty gracious that we care enough and are concerned enough about it to be doing it instead of taking the chance of them washing downstream, which is our biggest fear.”
But what worries Charron and others is that a little town like Northumberland can’t fight Mother Nature without a lot of financial help.
Northumberland has an annual budget of about $2.5 million.
So, $30,000 to move a few graves is a lot of money.
And finding $100,000 or more needed to shore up the banks seems impossible.
It’s also unclear whether it’s even possible to stop the erosion because the river is deep there.
The Connecticut River Joint Commissions studied the problem and tried to get money from the Upper Connecticut River Mitigation and Enhancement Fund.
The New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services had even agreed to come up with 60 percent of the money.
But Sharon Francis, the executive director of the Connecticut River Joint Commissions, says the effort failed.
“ it was unfortunate and we certainly felt badly. We put a lot of effort into first of all trying to find a solution and second of all trying to get the funding to implement the solution. But it was just one of those continued sorrows that a cemetery always represents.”
There are several reasons the erosion is bad in that area, according to studies done for the joint commissions.
One factor is the failure and then removal of the Wyoming dam in the 1980s.
It is several miles downstream and without it the water moves more quickly.
Whatever the cause Northumberland residents are wondering if they have a prayer of fighting the river to a standstill.
And Terri Charron says it still leaves the town in trouble.
“We are a small town and don’t seem to have the political pull that some of the other small towns in this state have and we just can’t seem to get the help that we need. You would think that cemeteries, where loved ones are buried, would be more important than some of the other projects that they have done, but evidently we are not.”
Moving the eight graves would provide enough room to bring in heavy machinery.
Charron says if only there was enough money, the town could start to reinforce the bank and avoid moving any other graves.
“And everybody else that is already buried here, it would be their final resting place.”
For NHPR News this is Chris Jensen in Bethlehem.
