Iowa Code § 523I.304 — IA Code / Title XIII / Chapter 523I / Section 523I.304
Rulemaking and enforcement.
Status: in_force

(1) A cemetery may adopt, amend, and enforce rules for the use, care, control, management, restriction, and protection of the cemetery, as necessary for the proper conduct of the business of the cemetery, including but not limited to the use, care, and transfer of any interment space or right of interment.

(2) A cemetery may restrict and limit the use of all property within the cemetery by rules that do, but are not limited to doing, all of the following:

(2) (a) Prohibit the placement of memorials or memorialization, buildings, or other types of structures within any portion of the cemetery.

(2) (b) Regulate the uniformity, class, and kind of memorials and memorialization and structures within the cemetery.

(2) (c) Regulate the scattering or placement of cremated remains within the cemetery.

(2) (d) Prohibit or regulate the placement of nonhuman remains within the cemetery.

(2) (e) Prohibit or regulate the introduction or care of trees, shrubs, and other types of plants within the cemetery.

(2) (f) Regulate the right of third parties to open, prepare for interment, and close interment spaces.

(2) (g) Prohibit interment in any part of the cemetery not designated as an interment space.

(2) (h) Prevent the use of space for any purpose inconsistent with the use of the property as a cemetery.

(3) A cemetery shall not adopt or enforce a rule that prohibits interment because of the race, color, or national origin of a decedent. A provision of a contract or a certificate of ownership or other instrument conveying interment rights that prohibits interment in a cemetery because of the race, color, or national origin of a decedent is void.

(4) A cemetery’s rules shall be plainly printed or typewritten and maintained for inspection in the office of the cemetery or, if the cemetery does not have an office, in another suitable place within the cemetery. The cemetery’s rules shall be provided to owners of interment spaces upon request.

(5) A cemetery’s rules shall specify the cemetery’s obligations in the event that interment spaces, memorials, or memorialization are damaged or defaced by acts of vandalism. The rules may specify a multiyear restoration of an interment space, or a memorial or memorialization when the damage is extensive or when money available from the cemetery’s trust fund is inadequate to complete repairs immediately. The owner of an interment space, or a memorial or memorialization that has been damaged or defaced shall be notified by the cemetery by restricted certified mail at the owner’s last known address within sixty days of the discovery of the damage or defacement. The rules shall specify whether the owner is liable, in whole or in part, for the cost to repair or replace an interment space or a damaged or defaced memorial or memorialization.

(6) The cemetery shall not approve any rule which unreasonably restricts competition, or which unreasonably increases the cost to the owner of interment rights in exercising these rights.

(7) A cemetery owned and controlled by a governmental subdivision shall adopt and enforce a rule allowing any veteran who is a landowner or who lives within the governmental subdivision to purchase an interment space and to be interred within the cemetery. The rule shall also allow any veteran who purchases an interment space within the cemetery to purchase an interment space for interment of the spouse of the veteran if such a space is available and shall allow the surviving spouse of a veteran interred within the cemetery to purchase an interment space and be interred within the cemetery if such a space is available. For the purposes of this section, “veteran” means the same as defined in section 35.1.

2005 Acts, ch 128, §26; 2007 Acts, ch 175, §44; 2009 Acts, ch 164, §5, 7; 2012 Acts, ch 1067, §1