Former cemetery chair crusades against new commission

The controversy concerns white fence posts, absent for years but installed by Whitcavitch and volunteers in previous years in North Cambridge and other cemeteries, that were removed by the current cemetery commission after they rotted.

Jen Bartlau, current chair of the cemetery commission, said the fences were beyond repair. She also said the posts were not installed at the correct depth below the frostline, which contributed to the leaning fencing.

According to Whitcavitch, the fences simply required straightening and minor maintenance. He believes the removal of fences and some signs were vindictive actions to punish him for complaining about the state of the town’s cemeteries.

One man’s anger

A veteran and, according to him, a Vermonter with ties that go back centuries, Whitcavitch’s social media posts read less as commentary than as polemics.

“It is a disgrace, plain and simple and at the taxpayers expense. SAD!” he wrote last week.

In an opinion piece published in the News & Citizen on June 24, Whitcavitch said he didn’t have any personal grudge against any elected official in Cambridge, but claimed that he left the cemeteries in pristine condition and brought issues he saw in the cemeteries to the commission’s attention in 2017, but they were not addressed.

“At this point I have lost all confidence in our selectboard and the Cambridge Cemetery Commission,” he wrote in the newspaper. “It is so sad to see these ancient burial grounds fall into despair, to say nothing about the expense to the taxpayers of the town.”

Whitcavitch has also claimed that the commission was required to maintain the fencing by Vermont state law, though the cemetery commission has responded that the law is in no way clear or that they should be directed to do that.

“A lot of people think because of the way I talk that they really believe that I’m a bully,” he said. “And also I’ve had some people even say that they’ve made comments and think I’m a sexist, which is totally wrong. I mean, I got respect for ladies and the only reason I was piping up to complain about this was because they were not doing the job that they were elected to do.”

The commission response

Despite Whitcavitch’s crusade, Bartlau said the commission has done what it believes is in taxpayers’ best interest and stayed the course in removing the fencing and signs.

In a June 1 presentation attempting to address public concerns, the commission said it respected the work of past volunteers, but that “threats, intimidation and harassment are unacceptable.”

The presentation’s conclusion: the cemetery fences were purely aesthetic and served no practical purpose, and removing the fencing entirely and using some of the materials to fix damaged fences in other cemeteries, while replacing leaning granite signs with safer signs, was the most cost-effective solution.

“In Mr. Whitcavitch’s letter to your editor in last week’s News & Citizen, he states that he left the cemeteries in ‘pristine’ condition when he left in 2016,” Bartlau said. “Why, then, would he notify the cemetery commission that the fences and signs needed repair in 2017? That implies that the cemeteries were not left as stated.”

An update will appear next week on the Cambridge town website that rotten fencing has been removed from some of the town cemeteries; the holes left behind have been marked and will be filled; granite signposts in North Cambridge and Hopkins cemeteries will be removed, as they are unsafe; and some monuments and gravestones will be cleaned in a multi-year process.

The commission voted to approve all of this publicly at their June 10 meeting, Barlau said.

Finding a way forward

Whitcavitch expressed particular concern about an off-the-record executive session that occurred at the June 1 selectboard meeting, in which he believes he was discussed. Board chair Courtney Leitz confirmed he was discussed in that session, but only because the board wished to avoid singling out Whitcavitch in the public record.

If he had accepted their invitation, Leitz said, he would have been allowed to participate in that session.

Whitcavitch denied he was invited to attend that meeting or the cemetery commission’s June 10 meeting.

Leitz said the invitation still stands, as he and all Cambridge residents are encouraged to attend town meetings and make themselves heard.

Leitz said the selectboard has publicly voiced its support for the cemetery commission and she has personally met with Bartlau, and is impressed by Bartlau’s commitment to and knowledge of the town’s history.

She encouraged Cambridge residents to participate in meetings and the municipal process, rather than take to social media.

“It’s going to result in volunteer people being very hesitant to volunteer moving forward,” Leitz said.