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Buy now, die later: Boise cemetery lot sales are ‘breaking records.’

A cemetery with green grass, tombstones and multiple trees.
Michael Day
/
Flickr

You've heard about the scarcity of a place to live in Boise, so you should probably also know that more families are snapping up cemetery plots. And they're not dying to get in, they're snapping them up for the future.

It’s budget season, and agencies and departments across the region are crunching numbers in anticipation of putting together new spending plans for the Fiscal Year 2023.  Late yesterday, the City of Boise’s Parks and Recreation Commission got an update on fees, capital improvement projects, repair and maintenance.

In reviewing Parks and Rec’s revenues, Superintendent Karen Bledsoe told commissioners that there has been a growing trend in people securing space in Boise cemeteries.

"Our cemeteries have been breaking records. In FY 20 we had 177,000. At the end of April, already in '22, we have 234. It's people buying lots ... more than actual burials. So I thought that was interesting," said Bledsoe.

The City of Boise Parks and Rec has more than 500 different types of fees, and for Fiscal Year 23, the department is projecting that it could collect about $10.9 million in revenues.

The commission recommended the adoption of the new fees and charges for the next fiscal year.The City Council will have the final say.

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