The Finance Committee met 08/21/2023. One of the items they took up was the St. Joseph’s Cemetery reimbursement request for the maintenance of veteran graves. This item had been referred back to the committee after questions were raised as to how much money if any the city was being asked to reimburse the cemetery versus how much Outagamie County would be reimbursing. The form indicated that the yearly cost of care and upkeep for each grave was $18, but the number of graves the reimbursement was for was not listed.
After further investigation, it turned out that St. Joseph’s Cemetery did not have the proper paperwork in place to request a reimbursement. The deadline to submit that paperwork to Outagamie County, the entity that would ultimately be making the payment, was September 1st, a deadline the cemetery would miss this year. As a result, the committee voted unanimously to deny the reimbursement request.
I’ve prepared a complete transcript of the discussion for download.
Finance Director Jeri Ohman explained to the committee that when they further researched the reimbursement request, they found out St. Joseph’s Cemetery had an endowment fund that covered some of the maintenance of the cemetery. The cemetery was not allowed to receive reimbursement from Outagamie County for the veterans’ graves that were covered by the endowment. There was a process that St. Joseph’s could go through to indicate which veterans’ graves were covered by that endowment and which ones were not, and they would then be able to be reimbursed for the uncovered graves. However, the deadline for submitting that information was September 1, and cemetery staff did not have time to pull that information together soon enough to meet that deadline. They did however know what they needed to do to submit a reimbursement request for next year.
The committee voted unanimously to deny the reimbursement request.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1110590&GUID=36FD7496-5713-41F0-B732-CF68547FACA3
WOW……..Another BLACK EYE for the City of Appleton…This is low. They should have given an extension the Cemetery.
The deadline was set by Outagamie County, the entity that would have ultimately paid for the reimbursement. It was not set by Appleton, so I don’t think the city had any ability to extend the deadline.
Hopefully, the maintenance of most of the veterans’ graves is covered by the endowment that was mentioned.