After cemetery strike, grieving Montreal families still waiting to bury loved ones

MONTREAL — For more than a year, an urn holding the ashes of Bridget Heffernan's brother has remained in her Montreal-area home instead of being buried in the plot at Notre-Dame-des-Neiges cemetery where her family members have been laid to rest for nearly a century.

While she doesn't mind having the urns at her home, she's looking forward to the moment when her mother and brother can be buried in the family plot, with a few family members present and a priest on hand to say a prayer.The cemetery was largely closed to the public from mid-January to mid-September last year due to a strike by some of its workers that, at one point, resulted in more than 300 bodies being kept in storage awaiting burial.

They’d originally hoped to hold the ceremony in April, on the one-year anniversary of her death, but Martin was told the backlog at the cemetery was too long to secure the date. He said the process has been emotionally difficult for the family, and especially for those who couldn't attend last year's funeral.

In frustration, she posted to a local Facebook page, asking if other people have had similar experiences. Several people responded with their own stories of trying to get a burial date, including some who have been waiting as long or longer than she has.

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