Perpetual care funds are collected as a percentage of burial rights easement sales and added to GCA investment funds. As these funds earn interest, proceeds are used to tend to restoration and preservation efforts at Gray Village Cemetery, where over 5,200 gravestones of various size, age, and stone mark burial locations.
In 2024, GCA Trustees formed a volunteer group - Grave Tenders - to meet monthly during "the season" to clean those gravestones most in need of a facelift. With their generous gift of time and talent, they safely and gently remove lichen, moss, grime, and dirt from 20-50 markers each month.
Recent grave tending work completed under our "perpetual care" program includes repairs and restorations completed during the 2023 MOCA Beginners Workshop in 2023, cleaning with D/2 and clear water by our Grave Tenders group, and contracted restoration work by Grave Stone Matters of Hoosick Falls, NY in June of 2024.