The San Marcos Cemetery is projected to have an additional 40 years of useful life after San Marcos City Council unanimously approved on Dec. 20 a $2.25 million contract with Jerry and Linda Fields for an additional 4.21 acres of land adjacent to the cemetery.

According to the city, the San Marcos Cemetery currently has room for approximately 800 additional plots. The city sells an average of 80 plots per year, meaning the cemetery has 8 to 10 years before it runs out of plots.

The newly purchased land, according to city officials, will generate 1,575 to 2,275 additional plots, effectively extending the cemetery’s useful life for 40 years. According to the resolution, the land is being purchased with funds from the Cemetery Perpetual Care Fund, which has a balance of $1,170,000 as well as the fiscal year 2019 Capital Improvement Project Fund, which has a balance of $1.2 million.

City officials project that the additional plots on the new land, located at 1401-1419 Old Ranch Road 12, will generate $2.9 million to $3.7 million in revenue for the city. Due to Texas law, the purchase of new cemetery land in a municipality’s city limits is not allowed unless it is adjacent to an existing cemetery.

"This is an excellent opportunity for the city considering we have a tremendous need for the expansion of our current cemetery," said San Marcos City Manager Bert Lumbreras. "We believe this is a great opportunity for the city because if we don’t take advantage of this site, we would literally have to locate a site outside of the city in the extra territorial jurisdiction and at the present rate in terms of the plots that we have we believe we only have 10 years left."

An additional $600,000 will be required for infrastructure improvements to transition the newly purchased land to an expansion of the cemetery, city officials said, but those funds will not be allocated until they are needed. Once the purchase is finalized, city officials plan to conduct a layout study for the cemetery.

"This is pretty much our one opportunity," said Mayor Jane Hughson. "And for those who don’t spend much time in the cemetery, it is a park. It’s beautiful. If you go over there on afternoons like today you’ll see people walking and sitting and contemplating for a while. So it’s a beautiful place to be and it’s really nice for that part of town where there aren’t a lot of parks."