Cemetery website upsets family

By ALANAH MAY ERIKSEN
A new online cemetery has upset Tokoroa resident Anna Sefo because she wasn't consulted before they put her dead son Clement's grave details on it.

The database means people with family members buried in South Waikato cemeteries in Tokoroa, Tirau and Putaruru will be able to find their relatives without leaving home.

Through the South Waikato District Council website, people can enter the name of a deceased person and print details about the grave site, including a map and a copy of the words on the headstone.

The council also wants to include photographs of all the graves featured on site and that's added to Mrs Sefo's concerns.

"We really don't like this," she said as she lit incense at her son's grave.

"We don't want to advertise our son. We are a very close family and prefer to keep his details private.

"The council should have actually contacted the families to see if they would allow it," she said.

The website features her son's full name, age, date of death, old address in Hamilton, and exactly where his grave is at the Tokoroa cemetery.

Mrs Sefo visits her son's and other family members' graves twice a week. "I've lived in this town since 1960, I know everybody and I know for a fact others will be upset about it," she said.



South Waikato District Council parks officer Theo Schonberger said the council was always getting inquiries about deceased people and the website was a way of making details more accessible to the public.

"Only this morning someone rang up and congratulated us on the site and how easy it was to use," he told the Daily Post.

The council did not have to get permission from families to start up the database as the information could be obtained through other means, said Mr Schonberger.

He said the council was considering photographing the graves in the near future.

The Rotorua District Council does not have an online cemetery but director of kaupapa Maori, Mauriora Kingi, said he believed family members should have been consulted before details were put on the South Waikato council's website.