Is it a cemetery … or a park?

Spot the gravemarkers ... the only indicators that Ventura's Cemetery Park is actually a real cemetery.

The debate over what to do with Cemetery Park is dragging on for so long it’s like one long funeral.

A funeral, I say, because it seems everyone involved on both sides of a heated redesign proposal for the Midtown Ventura parcel is already mourning the loss of something that hasn’t happened yet.

Those who want to keep the park as it is — a recreational space for dogs and residents — are mourning the possibility of their play space being taken away. Those who want it restored back to a cemetery have been mourning the interred there for over 40 years. And neither wants to see the $4 million memorial project go through. The former group even has 960 signatures stating so.

This debacle is also like a funeral because, like so many are, it ends up becoming more about the people grieving than it does about the deceased being buried.

With the exception of one man in Ventura who’s dedicated all his passion to restoring St. Mary’s back to its religious graveyard roots, everyone seems to forget there are over 3,000 people in the ground at the park. They’re under your feet as you run and play Frisbee with your dog, or volleyball with your mates.

It’s just an observation, and not meant to malign. I walk by Cemetery Park almost daily and enjoy the green space for what it is. But if you do pass on by, spotting the sparse amount of markers is like a morbid game of “Where’s Waldo.”

Excepting this contentious issue, I have to give credit to our city council for thinking of other people’s needs first. They decided to defer their decision on the park redesign on Monday because there wasn’t enough time left in their meeting. Better to drag on the problem than make a hasty decision that will only end up being divisive to Venturans.

I do hope that the council, whatever they decide, can consider that Cemetery Park, by name, is contradictory and needs a new moniker. It’s a cemetery, yes … but is is a park? Well, sort of.

My suggestion? If you keep the park as is, rename it something new and snappy, like “Poli Park,” or “Midtown Center Park.” Obviously, by maintaining the status quo, you’re further ignoring the dead under the ground … the “Cemetery” in Cemetery Park would sound so insignificant at that point.

If you revert it back to a graveyard, bring back “St. Mary’s Cemetery.” Because it’s never been anything but.

And by approving the new memorial project, “Cemetery Park” becomes more appropriate, because it strikes a good balance between the cemetery and the park.

It’s the least we could do for making this problem less about us … and more about them.

Bury this fiasco already

The jaunty, playful bond between human and dog should remain at Cemetery Park, say petitioners.

I didn’t call it a fiasco. They did. About a thousand times over.

At least that’s about how many fliers petitioning a graveyard memorial project I saw plastered this weekend on every single car up and down Poli Street, the downtown thoroughfare that crosses with Cemetery Park.

Cemetery Park, to the uninitiated, is the infamous burial ground turned dog park that an army of Venturans is hoping to keep that way. They oppose an expensive project backed by city hall that calls for a series of bronze markers, a topiary garden and remembrance wall to immortalize the more than 3,000 pioneers interred there, much to the chagrin of petitioners who want a dog park, and traditionalists who want neither, preferring instead the parcel revert to its original, stoic cemetery state.

The petitions were distributed around town during Saturday’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade, where the project was vehemently called a “fiasco” on the 8×11-sized papers. As of last month, the petition had garnered about 500 signatures; it’d be interesting to see how many more were obtained through last weekend’s windshield effort.

Does it qualify as propagandist on their behalf? Perhaps … but at least they could get their facts straight. The last we reported on the matter, it was verified by officials that the project would cost less than $4 million. Petitioners for the Preserve Cemetery Park awareness effort, however, still maintain that original, and rumored, dollar figure.

Three thousand, four million, six feet under … when will the fiasco end?

The many faces of Cemetery Park

Who knew that a noteworthy tract of land could mean so many things to so many people? Wednesday evening’s special city parks and rec commission meeting in Ventura was packed to the gills with people voicing their views on Cemetery Park, that quiet, green tract of land between Poli and Main streets that has been gaining quite a bit of noise lately.

The meeting was held to unveil a concept project for the cemetery-turned-dog park; erection of a memorial wall, planting of lush gardens, along with some thousands of grave markers, so costly that even the concept plans seen last night amounted to more than this writer’s annual salary.

But it looked like every penny went into the study, and the contract team behind it even took into account the terraced memorial garden, proposed for the park’s far end, as a reflection of Ventura’s local ecology and riparian habitat. It’s an attempt, they said, of recalling the “memory of the earth” as a mirror to the city’s work in recalling the memories of the 3,000 dead interred there.

I’m not so sure many of the residents in attendance at the meeting — many longtime and retired — warmed up to the glossy L.A. design of the concept and presentation. There was a sense in the room that nobody knows the needs of Ventura like they do.

Yet, if it was up to a popular vote, opinion would be split three ways: should we preserve Cemetery Park for what it once was, keep it as the parkland it is today, or agree to compromise?

It may not be that simple, according to a very perceptive audience. One man questioned the study’s lack of addressing storm drainage capacity.  Another man, the heritage of the interred’s Chumash members. And still, praise from another woman who has family buried there.

One thing I’m wondering is: are we doing this more to please the living of Ventura, or the dead?