Volunteers team up to give Eye town cemetery a little TLC

A trio of town councillors have hailed a volunteer cemetery clean-up day as a huge success, while thanking people for their support.

Kim Crispin, Jean Bush and Caroline O’Donnell were joined at Eye Cemetery on August 18 by 28 others, including former councillors Ian Winter and Clive Hill, to help clean up the area.

The group worked for more than four hours and dramatically changed the state of the site just off the B1117, according to Cllr Crispin.

“Everything went to plan and could not have gone better,” she added.

“Old gravestones that had been covered under long grass and weeds can now be seen standing in the sunshine.

“It was an extremely hot day for everyone. Eventually, we had to call it a day because of health and safety but all the volunteers did a fantastic job and the end result was brilliant.”

The councillor, speaking on behalf of the trio, said they could not thank the event’s supporters enough for coming together to help.

She said: “It just goes to show you how passionate people are about the cemetery and how much they care.

“It also gave us the chance to learn a lot about people’s concerns for the cemetery.”

The councillors are hoping to set up a permanent cemetery project group, which will not only look after the site, but also do fundraising events to help maintain it.

Cllr Bush added: “We want to keep it the best we can for people to use as we feel it is a very important place and now hope to raise money for the chapel and to look after some of the gravestones.”

The next Eye Cemetery clean up will be on September 29 at 10.30am.