Pictured, left to right, are Oakwood Cemetery Board of Regents Member Ellen Hoffer, Sexton Hal Heagy and Board President Ken Locke. Photo by Jackie Gorski, Times-Union.

By Jackie Gorski
Times-Union

WARSAW — Oakwood Cemetery Board of Regents continued discussing Thursday, Oct. 2, the possibility of renting out the chapel at the cemetery.

This was the second month the topic was discussed after Sexton Hal Heagy said he wanted to revisit the topic in order to bring in some money to the cemetery to supplement what they have. In September, Heagy said being able to rent out the chapel would not be a guarantee as the idea came up before to former Mayor Joe Thallemer and City Attorney Scott Reust, who didn’t think it was a good idea.

Heagy said he would like to revisit the idea with current Mayor Jeff Grose. Heagy said it is going to be asked what they are going to use the chapel for, and he wanted to have some ideas to present to Grose and anyone else he would possibly meet with.

Thursday, Heagy said some of the board members have sent him some ideas but asked the board members again if they could think of any ways the chapel could be rented out to send those ideas to him. Heagy has already had a couple people contact him about renting the chapel out and he has had to tell them they are not renting the chapel yet and they are in the infancy stages of looking into the issue. As far as to who to rent the chapel out to, Heagy said he doesn’t want to get into what Parks and Recreation Department Superintendent Larry Plummer does with the parks.

Heagy said he thought the chapel would be a good place for small gatherings and didn’t want to cater to large groups. He suggested possibly renting out to meetings and trying to stay away from renting the chapel out on Saturdays. He didn’t want to cancel something if the chapel was needed for a funeral.

Board President Ken Locke said he talked to the cemetery in his hometown in Iowa as they have a community building at the cemetery. He said they usually keep rentals to nonprofits, with the exceptions of funeral homes. He suggested possibly having Oakwood rent out the chapel to nonprofits.

In other business, the board heard:

• The Veterans Day ceremony will be at 10:30 a.m. Nov. 11.

• The garden giveaway yielded 125 pounds of produce this year, which was given to The Salvation Army.

• A new wall will be installed in Section 17 on Oct. 13.

• New asphalt will be down on a section of road that branches off Lake Road.

• Vincent Werner was hired as a laborer and started Sept. 29.

• The fence behind the office is still waiting on repair.