General Information

General Information

For information about cemeteries select from the options below.

 

• Cemetery Definition
• Approval required for establishing, operating or altering a cemetery
• Approval required when selling or transferring a cemetery
• Updating cemetery information with The Saskatchewan Genealogy Society
• Disposing of Human Remain
• Interments
• Interment of indigent persons
• Depth of interment        
• No interment under buildings
• Interment of unidentified human remains
• Dis-interments

 

Cemetery Definition

A “cemetery” means any land or place that is set apart or used as a place of interment and that is approved as a cemetery pursuant to this Act and includes any buildings that are incidental or ancillary to that land or place.

 

Approval required for establishing, operating or altering a cemetery (section 3)

The Cemeteries Act, 1999 requires any new cemeteries or those being enlarged or relocated to be registered with the Registrar, The Cemeteries Act and no person shall establish, operate, alter the boundaries of or relocate a cemetery without the prior written approval of the registrar. Cemeteries include land used for columbaria and mausoleums.

• Guidelines for Establishing or Enlarging a Cemetery

 

Approval required when selling or transferring a cemetery (section 48)

Unless the registrar consents in writing, a cemetery or land used for a columbarium or mausoleum shall not be transferred, sold, mortgaged, pledged, charged or encumbered by the owner or any person having an interest in that cemetery or land.

 

Updating cemetery information with The Saskatchewan Genealogy Society (SGS)

With one of the most complete sources for Saskatchewan cemetery information, owners are encouraged to keep their cemetery information updated with the SGS. 

 

Disposing of Human Remains (sections 2, 61, regulation 37)

•  “cremated human remains” means human bone fragments that remain after cremation;
• “human remains” means a dead human body, but does not include cremated human remains;

In Saskatchewan,

1. No person shall dispose of human remains at any place in Saskatchewan other than:

(a) in a cemetery; or
(b) by cremation in accordance with The Funeral and Cremation Services Act.

2. No person shall inter or cremate human remains unless accompanied by a burial permit issued pursuant to The Vital Statistics Act, 2009 (see also section 90 of The Funeral and Cremation Services Act).

An exception:

Regulation 37

(1) A burial permit is not required to:

(a) re-inter human remains that have been disinterred; and
(b) inter foetal remains if, pursuant to The Vital Statistics Act, 2009, a burial permit is not ssued.

(2) An owner must require proof of permission to disinter human remains pursuant to The Public Health Act, 1994 or The Coroners Act, 1999 in order to reinter disinterred human remains.

3. No person shall cremate human remains except in an authorized crematorium (section 94 of The Funeral and Cremation Services Act).

 

Interments (section 2, regulations 25, 31 – 33, 38)

“interment” means:

(i) the burial of human remains or cremated human remains in a cemetery; (this does not include animal remains).
(ii) the entombment of human remains in a mausoleum; or
(iii) the inurnment of cremated human remains in a columbarium;

The sprinkling of cremated ashes does not have to occur in an approved cemetery, however, if it occurs in a cemetery, records of the scattering are required to be kept.

Regulation 25 (2) An owner shall maintain a register of cremated human remains interred or scattered in the cemetery, if the owner has been paid for or has authorized interment or scattering (see regulation 25 for the details of what is required).

 

Interment of indigent persons

31 For purposes of section 50 of the Act, a unit administrator pursuant to The Saskatchewan Assistance Regulations is prescribed as a person who may authorize interment of unclaimed human remains or a deceased indigent person.

 

Depth of interment        

32(1) Unless the registrar determines that special circumstances exist, human remains are to be interred so that the top of the outer burial container is at least 76 centimetres (30 inches) below the surface of the ground.

(2) Where interment is made at less than the depth required pursuant to subsection (1), the owner shall make an entry in the register mentioned in section 25.

 

No interment under buildings

33 An owner shall not inter human remains, in a vault or otherwise, within three metres of the outer wall of any church or chapel or within two metres of any other building in the cemetery.

 

Interment of unidentified human remains

38 In the case of unidentified human remains where a burial permit is not issued pursuant to The Vital Statistics Act, 2009, the human remains may be interred when permission to bury the human remains has been given pursuant to The Coroners Act, 1999.

 

Dis-interments (regulation 36, regulation 30 of The Disease Control Regulations)

36 Disinterment of human remains shall occur only in accordance with The Public Health Act, 1994 or The Coroners Act, 1999 and regulations pursuant to those Acts.

The Disease Control Regulations of The Public Health Act, 1994

The Disinterment permit
30(1) Subject to subsection (2) and The Coroners Act, 1999, no person shall disinter the body of a deceased person without obtaining a disinterment permit from the minister.

(2) Subsection (1) does not apply:

(a) if the body in question is to be disinterred from one location and re-interred in another location in the same cemetery or mausoleum; or
(b) to cremated remains.