2023 New York Laws › RCO - Religious Corporations › Article 2 - General Provisions › 7 - Acquisition of Property by Religious Corporations for Cemetery Purposes; Management Thereof.

§  7.  Acquisition  of property by religious corporations for cemetery
purposes; management thereof. A religious corporation may take and hold,
by purchase, grant, gift or devise, real property for the purposes of  a
cemetery;  or such lot or lots in any cemetery connected with it, as may
be conveyed or devised  to  it,  with  or  without  provisions  limiting
interments  therein to particular persons or classes of persons; and may
take and hold any property granted, given, devised or bequeathed  to  it
in  trust to apply the same or the income or proceeds thereof, under the
direction of the trustees of the corporation,  for  the  improvement  or
embellishment  of  such  cemetery  or  any  lot  therein,  including the
erection,  repair,  preservation  or  removal   of   tombs,   monuments,
gravestones,  fences,  railings  or  other erections, or the planting or
cultivation of trees, shrubs, plants, or flowers in or around  any  such
cemetery or cemetery lots.
A  religious  corporation  may  erect upon any property held by it for
cemetery purposes, a suitable building for religious  services  for  the
burial  of  the  dead,  or  for  the use of the keepers or other persons
employed in connection therewith, and may sell and convey lots  in  such
cemetery   for   burial   purposes,   subject  to  such  conditions  and
restrictions as may be imposed by the instrument by which the  same  was
acquired,  or  by the rules and regulations adopted by such corporation.
Every such conveyance of a lot or  plat  for  burial  purposes,  signed,
sealed and acknowledged in the same manner as a deed to be recorded, may
be  recorded  in  like  manner  and  with  like effect as a deed of real
property.
Notwithstanding the provisions of section four  hundred  fifty-one  of
the  real  property law or any other provision of law to the contrary, a
religious corporation that prior  to  January  first,  nineteen  hundred
eighty-four  received  a special permit from the zoning board of appeals
for the use of certain real property as a cemetery  and  which  actually
used  such  real  property  for  cemetery  purposes,  may  use such real
property for  cemetery  purposes  without  the  consent  of  the  county
legislative body for the county in which such real property is situated.
No  religious  corporation  owning, managing or controlling a cemetery
shall, directly or indirectly:
(a) sell, or have, enter into or perform a lease of any  of  its  real
property dedicated to cemetery purposes or adjacent thereto to a funeral
entity, or use any of its property for locating a funeral entity;
(b) commingle its funds with a funeral entity;
(c) direct or carry on its cemetery related business or affairs with a
funeral entity;
(d) authorize control of its cemetery related business or affairs by a
funeral entity;
(e)  engage in any sale or cross-marketing of goods or services with a
funeral entity;
(f) have, enter into or perform a management or service  contract  for
cemetery operations with a funeral entity; or
(g)  have, enter into or perform a management contract with any entity
other than a not-for-profit cemetery or religious corporation.
Only the provisions of subparagraphs  (a)  and  (b)  of  the  previous
paragraph  shall  apply  to  religious corporations with thirty acres or
less of real property dedicated to cemetery purposes, and  only  to  the
extent  the  sale  or  lease  is  of real property dedicated to cemetery
purposes, and such cemeteries shall not engage in the  sale  of  funeral
home  goods or services, except if such goods and services are otherwise
permitted to be sold  by  cemeteries.  No  religious  corporation  shall
approve  or  authorize the construction of a mausoleum or columbarium on
property owned by the religious  corporation  where  such  mausoleum  or

columbarium  shall  be  the  only form of interment offered for cemetery
purposes unless a management contract has  been  entered  into  with  an
existing  cemetery  corporation  regulated  under article fifteen of the
not-for-profit corporation law, that will provide operational management
of  the  mausoleum  or  columbarium,  and  the owner of the mausoleum or
columbarium has reserved interment space and secured interment  services
in a cemetery regulated under this article, in order to assure continued
perpetual  care of the remains contained in the mausoleum or columbarium
should such mausoleum or columbarium become abandoned or choose to cease
operations.