There is growing concern about the State Veterans Cemetery in Middletown.
It’s expected to run out of space in the coming years and now there’s an urgent search for how to expand it.
At the State Veterans Cemetery, you can find the final resting place for more than 16,000 veterans and their family members.
“It is striking to see those acres of stones lined up and it's very gratifying to see that they're so well cared for,” Ken McClellan said.
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McClellan runs the Greater Middletown Military Museum and is a veteran himself.
He and others are concerned the cemetery could run out of space in the next three years.
“There's more veterans in Connecticut still living than we have capacity for. So it would be nice to make sure we have a place for them,” McClellan said.
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There had been a plan to expand the cemetery into about 90 acres nearby owned by the city of Middletown.
But at a meeting in November, the Common Council rejected the potential sale to the state.
We reached out to the mayor for an update but have not yet heard back.
It came amid concerns from neighbors, including about the possible impact on property values and the environment, as well as the sale process itself.
“I am very sympathetic to Vets Cemetery running out of room. And I wholeheartedly want them to have a final resting place, but this site is not the proper location for expansion,” Megan Carta, of Middletown, said during the meeting.
Now there are calls from the State Capitol to find a long-term solution.
Senator Jeff Gordon (R-Woodstock) is on the legislature’s Veterans and Military Affairs Committee.
“We can't wait. We still have veterans, unfortunately, who pass away. And we have the cemetery for them, and rightly so. So this is somewhat of an urgency now,” Gordon said.
The senator recently sent a letter to the Veterans Affairs commissioner for an update on the process.
We reached out to the department for an interview, but we were told no one was available on Wednesday.
