Some current and former residents of Macoun took action last week to counteract some vandalism that had recently occurred in the village’s cemetery.
Twenty-two people gathered to clean up the damage, which happened in separate incidents in May. The first incident was just before Mother’s Day, as the second was prior to the Victoria Day long weekend.
Approximately 30 headstones were pushed over or damaged in those incidents.
“We organized a group to go out and try to repair, the best we can, most of the headstones,” said Carmen Dodd-Vicary in an interview with the Mercury.
The public was “very upset” and “very outraged” about the vandalism, and they wanted to do something to make the cemetery look good again. While some of the participants were Macoun residents, others were those who used to live in the area, or who have family buried in the cemetery.
“We worked on placing the headstones back up, making sure that they were secured with a good base foundation, a putty, and wanted to make it look nice again, not only for the residents in Macoun, but the families who have lost loved ones and for those who are buried out at the cemetery,” said Dodd-Vicary.
It took a little more than an hour for the volunteers to finish the work. They formed small groups and completed the tasks without argument.
“It was tough, because it’s a sad situation and people are very upset about it, but it was very nice to see the people coming together to work on it and get it looking nice as a group,” said Dodd-Vicary. “Council of the Village of Macoun is very upset about what had happened, the residents of Macoun are very upset.
“I’ve had phone calls from families who don’t live around here anymore who have loved ones in the Macoun cemetery. They phoned me as soon as they found out to make sure their families’ gravestones were still intact. It’s amazing how many people this has affected,” said Dodd-Vicary.
Cameras that were set up at the cemetery were smashed, with the memory card removed.
Ideally people would have rather gone out there for a normal maintenance cleanup, she said, than having to repair headstones that were vandalized.
A couple of headstones will need to be fixed professionally, but outside of that, Dodd-Vicary believes they completed the work that needed to be done.
Cpl. Craig Park with the Estevan RCMP said that over the past several weeks, the RCMP has had multiple complaints of vandalism at the cemetery. They have identified two culprits and continue to investigate.
“This type of mischief is very concerning and grabs the attention of a lot of people as was evident in the gathering of volunteers to right this wrong,” Park said.
A spray paint incident also occurred last week at the gymnasium of the Macoun School. That incident is also under investigation.
“We’re really at a loss for what to do so we’re really relying on the Estevan RCMP,” said Dodd-Vicary. “There’s been a huge increase in police presence in the municipality over the last month. It’s been well-noticed, and we just hope that we can catch whoever did this, so this can be taken care of and deal with it properly.”
If anybody does know anything, Dodd-Vicary hopes they will contact the Estevan RCMP at 306-637-4400.
