The park-like splendor of Waukegan’s Oakwood Cemetery, with its oak tree canopies and manicured lawns, continued to be revived by landscapers this week.
The effort comes ahead of Saturday’s “History Walk” through the grounds, with actors explaining the stories involving some of the well-known people buried there.
A showpiece for the city, along with the Waukegan Park District and Waukegan Historical Society, the 30th-annual edition features a 90-minute walk through the grounds. It leaves the restored Carnegie Library, located at 1 N. Sheridan Road, from 12-2:15 p.m., with information at: http://www.waukeganparks.org/oakwood.
The larger scope going forward is developing a consistent program to maintain the beauty of the grounds. The infrequent and somewhat haphazard care of the more than 150-year-old cemetery has raised concerns from families and others.
“Oakwood Cemetery means a great deal to generations of my family, and many families in our community,’ said Diana Dretske, a Waukegan historian. “Caring for the grounds and inviting the community to gather and hear stories is a marvelous celebration.”
Waukegan Mayor Sam Cunningham has said that a plan has taken shape with dedicated goals under the city’s Public Works Department budget.
“This isn’t just grass-cutting; it is a maintenance program that we will institute for the cemetery, which is part of our assets in the city,” Cunningham said. “Just like City Hall, the library building, Police Department, Fire Department … this is the same thing, and it needs to be maintained properly. We are responsible.
Cunningham, City Clerk Janet Kilkelly, Public Works Director Chris Garland, and District 8 Lake County Board member Diane Hewitt toured the grounds on Tuesday to discuss some of the current initiatives and past lapses in care.
Dead trees that presented hazardous safety issues, red-marked several years ago, have been removed. Garland noted that engineering and design plans to repair the cemetery’s roads are underway, with work beginning this year.
“Our goal is a three-step plan, the first phase being getting these roads together,” the mayor said. “The next phase, we went out and talked to specialists who do headstone (restoration), looking at cost estimates, what the damages are right now, and consulting with us. What can we do today, and long term?
“The third phase is having a tree arborist come out, and that’s already been done … (and) find a plan to maintain them over the years,” he said. “The bottom line, we didn’t focus on those deals. Now that we are, it’s part of our normal public works maintenance program.”
Other targets are neglected property areas such as the southern end, and coordinating with Union Pacific to alleviate potential damages again from clear-cutting the eastern bluff.
Waukegan-based G&S Landscaping Inc. currently has four contracts with the city. Concerns reached City Hall this year about a lack of grounds maintenance for prime dates, including Mother’s Day and Memorial Day, in lieu of working to “beautify” other sites for other events.
“We (will) come up with a systematic maintenance program that will cover those days,” Cunningham said. “Whether every week, or every two weeks, we’ll put the emphasis on those days, I agree … it will happen.”
“There is a lot of work that needs to be done, and not maintained over the last 10-15 years,” he said. “I will say this, around budget time, we’ll have something in place to maintain this asset for the city of Waukegan. What you’ll see in the public works budget is cemetery dollars, and broken out on what it’s for.”
Kilkelly noted a cemetery genealogy project and migrating records of nearly 10,000 people to a cloud for research.
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“It’s been about two years,” she said. “The history is always there, and families come back to do their own genealogy. The cemetery walk is important because it highlights those people.”