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Supporters urge oversight of pet cemeteries, recounting forced exhumations
Summary
Supporters of Senate Bill 157 told the House Regulatory Reform Committee that Michigan lacks basic regulation for pet cemeteries and described traumatic exhumations after closures; the bill would require deeds to include land dedications, mandated recordkeeping, endowed care funds and county health review for siting.
Senate Bill 157, introduced to the committee as a consumer‑protection measure, would set minimum requirements for pet cemetery operators, including land dedications recorded on deeds, detailed records of burial agreements, annual reports, and the creation of endowed care funds to ensure ongoing maintenance.
Senator Bair introduced the bill and said constituents brought the issue to lawmakers’ attention after closures and disruptions at a site known in testimony as Heavenly Acres. Andrea McMillan, an attorney with Attorneys for Animals, told the committee the industry is largely unregulated in Michigan and that the substitute before the committee raises the required endowed care fund amount to better prepare operators for unforeseen expenditures. "This bill would likely have prevented what happened almost 8 years ago in Livingston County when Heavenly Acres closed," McMillan said.
Eric Wexler, a West Bloomfield resident who testified remotely, described discovering in 2019 that the pet cemetery where his family had buried their pet did not actually own the land and that a lease termination forced him and others to exhume remains. "Because of a court order, we were forced to exhume the remains of Dash back in the summer of 2019," Wexler said, urging the committee to vote in favor of the bill. Anne Griffin, representing Michigan Humane and the relevant section of the State Bar, emphasized the human‑animal bond and urged regulation to prevent predatory or negligent operators, and noted the bill would require county health department preapproval for proposed cemetery locations and appropriate permits for crematoriums.
Committee members asked which department would manage regulation; witnesses did not identify a single department during the hearing. The transcript records that a House substitute exists and that proponents said the substitute adds safeguards, including higher endowed care funding and mapping requirements, but an exact fund amount was not stated on the record.
The committee took testimony from multiple witnesses and remote speakers; no final vote on SB 157 was recorded in the transcript during this session.
