We are in a time of absolutely profound change. This is the most serious up

people that we've seen in funerary dispositions and in cemeteries ever in

our nation's history. Conservation Marial takes it kind of a step further. The

focus is really on the land and wildlife protection and restoration.

Welcome to Depth in the afternoon. The podcast from your favorite funeral

reform nerds at the Order of the Good Death. I'm Caitlin Dodie, founder of the

Order and today's episode is about green burial grounds, conservation

cemeteries, and how you would go about opening one. This is actually one of the

most common emails that we get. All of you seem to want to start a green

burial ground. And listen, I get it. Heck, I want a green burial ground. I'm

absolutely ready for the period in my life when I have a simple little house on

a piece of land that also is home to a bunch of lovely dead people. Naturally

buried nearby. Maybe there's a brook, some trees, we're rewilding some native

species. What's not to love? But here's the thing. If it was that easy, I'd

already have a burial ground. You'd have a burial ground like most things in

North American death care. Regulations are idiosyncratic, access-difficult, land

expensive, permitting a bureaucratic quagmire. And if you're in a city, forget

about it. And what about all the abandoned cemeteries we already have? So today

we're talking to a legal expert in cemeteries and in our second act, someone who

actually did what we all seem to want to do. First, let's welcome Tanya Marsh.

Tanya is a professor at Wake Forest University School of Law focusing on

laws regarding the status, treatment, and disposition of human remains. She's the

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