Friends group grabs funding

New Friends of Dewsbury Cemetery was awarded the money from voluntary group One Community to help with its regeneration and maintenance work at the cemetery.

Friends chairman Simon Reed said: “We were absolutely delighted to receive it – we normally get turned down.”

The friends have continued their routine litter picks and ground checks, but were also keen to deal with dog walkers who fail to keep their pets under control after mess was found on graves.

“It’s just really upsetting. It’s disgusting and disrespectful that someone would let their dog do that,” he said.

The money awarded by One Community will be used to buy tree planters that will be placed at the bottom end of the cemetery.

Mr Reed said the group wanted to clean-up the potholes at that side of the cemetery and work on making the whole entrance look more appealing to visitors.

The group previously applied from Heritage Lottery Fund cash but was turned down.

And Mr Reed said an internet campaign to raise money to fix the cemetery’s damaged chapels, via website Crowdfunder, was not as successful as members hoped.

The project would have required £120,000 to be raised before the money for the grade II listed chapels was released, but Mr Reed said the crowd-funding idea was more to test the water to see what kind of support could be drummed-up for chapel repairs.

He said the group was looking to work more closely with Kirklees Council again on the options for a side gate to the cemetery.

Mr Reed said it had become an area where gangs loitered and was intimidating to people visiting their relatives, especially if they travelled by themselves.

He said it had been some time since the friends had heard from the council but that he had written to chief executive Adrian Lythgo to discuss some of the improvements the group would like to make.