Dusk is a time of day when shadows are long and memories run deep, and it's the time of day Cindy Ezell-Hinson often comes to Green Hill Memorial Gardens to see her family.
Cindy once considered Green Hill Memorial Gardens in Hopkinsville to be a place of serenity, but now for her the scars of this place have been as deep as the ruts that dot the landscape.
"They need to take care of all of these graves. None of this should be happening," Cindy said on a recent evening with the sun setting behind her.
Across the 23 acres of this sacred ground there are markers sinking in to the ground. Some are covered in dirt and hard to read. Others appear to have been nearly run over by a backhoe.
"It bothers me because no cemetery should look this way. It is disrespectful," she added.
"I'm sorry it's no disrespect to any family because I take each and every family seriously," said owner Jason Strader.
"I'm striving for this to be proud, where I would put my parents," he added.
Jason bought the cemetery in 2012, and according to him the previous owner did little in the way of maintenance.
The result he said were the current conditions he's been working to improve.
"When it would rain all these people's markers would be under water, so in 2013 we paid to move every individual out of there," he said pointing to a section of the cemetery which often floods.
He admitted though it's a slow process.
"There are issues here at the cemetery I'm fully aware of," he added.
A public meeting has been scheduled for Friday, March 4 at 6 p.m. at the 37 Lodge on 103 Academy Road in Hopkinsville. The mayor and all of the city counsel have been invited for an open discussion about the cemetery.
