In April of this year, the Scranton Township trustees received partial funding for a project that will have a large impact on the Scranton Township Cemetery.
The trustees applied for a grant from the Greene County Community Foundation to purchase cemetery management software. This software will enable the Scranton township clerk to create and maintain more accurate, detailed records of loved ones interred at the Cemetery.
The trustees asked for $18,750 of the total project cost of $25,000, with $6,250 of costs to be borne by cemetery funds. The $18,750 included the cost of the original software license ($4,000), the mapping work ($9,000) and a portion of the data entry costs ($5,750).
There were more grant requests than dollars available, so the trustees received $9,375 of their request, or 50 percent from the Foundation.
The project is in progress now. Ramaker & Associates, Inc. of Madison, WI, is creating a map of the cemetery using satellite technology. When the mapping is completed, current cemetery records will be matched with the burial spaces on the map. Eventually interested persons will be able to access online burial data. Similar to other navigation systems, the software will even be able to provide directions to a particular burial space. The management software features will aid genealogical researchers, those persons desiring to purchase burial space(s), the general public visiting the cemetery, as well as the trustees and the clerk.
Current record-keeping for the cemetery involves a basic spreadsheet with line-by-line data. The information is not easily transferable to the management software. It has been determined that the data will need to be manually entered into the online database — that is, keying in the information one record at a time. Having the company do this data entry work would be very expensive; therefore the existing cemetery records will be entered by the clerk and another assistant.
The trustees would welcome any contributions from the community to go toward the project. When proposing the project, the trustees intended to use some the cemetery’s available funds to pay for parts of the project, as mentioned above.
With only partial grant funding being received, more funds are needed beyond those the trustees had budgeted. This project is a major undertaking by the trustees and any help from the public will certainly be appreciated.
Peoples Bank in Scranton will accept any designated donations and deposit them directly into the Scranton Township Cemetery bank account to go toward the management software project. Thanks in advance to any community members who contribute to this project!
Persons who want more information can contact the Scranton Township trustees including Glen Christensen, Neal Hoyt and Al Robson. Township clerk is Debra Fey. ~courtesy of The Scranton Journal
