cemeteries to change the definition of cemeteries, to assure greater access to authorize county judges to improve and maintain access roads leading to cemeteries and for other purposes:An act to amend Arkansas code 5-39-212 regarding the unlawful fencing of
Subtitle: To amend the Arkansas law regarding the unlawful fencing of
cemeteries, to permit greater access and to allow counties to improve cemetery access roads.BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ARKANSAS
Section 1, Arkansas Code 5-39-212 is amended to read as follows:
"5-39-212. Cemeteries - Access - Debris - Disturbance
(a) It shall be unlawful for any person, firm, corporation, partnership
or association to:
(1) Construct any fence on any property in such manner as to enclose any
cemetery unless suitable access by automobile to the cemetery is provided
by gate or otherwise. The word "cemetery" as used in this subsection is
not intended to apply to any private family burial plot which contains
less than five (5) commercial grave markers. Nothing in this section
prohibits the placement of a fence around any cemetery for the purpose of
defining boundaries or protection of grave sites:
(2) Place any brush, tree tops, rubbish or other unsightly debris on any
cemetery grounds, or to disturb, damage, or carry away any marker in a
cemetery.
(b) Any person, firm, corporation, partnership or association violating
any of the provisions of this section shall be guilty of a misdemeanor
and upon conviction shall be fined in any sum not less than ten dollars
nor more than one hundred dollars, and every day that the violation shall
exist shall be a separate offense.
SECTION 2: The county judges of the several county governments in
Arkansas shall be authorized to improve and maintain any roads across
public or private lands used or to be used for access to a cemetery.
The cemetery access roads shall be constructed to a standard and nature
to permit their use by automobiles. A cemetery as used in this section
means any burying place for the dead, a burial plot, a graveyard, or any
land, public or private, dedicated and used for the interment of human
remains, which includes at least five (5) commercial grave markers.
SECTION 3: All provisions of this act of general and permanent nature
are amendatory to the Arkansas Code of 1987 Annotated and the Arkansas
Code Revision Commission shall incorporate the same in the Code.
SECTION 4: If any provisions of this act or the application thereof to
any person or circumstance is held invalid, the invalidity shall not
affect other provisions or applications of the act which can be given
effect without the invalid provisions or application, and to this end the
provisions of this act are declared to be severable.
SECTION 5: All laws and parts of laws in conflict with this act are
hereby repealed.
Approved: Jim Guy Tucker, Governor 4/14/95