How To Qualify For A Burial Plot In A State Cemetery
There are hundreds of thousands of cemeteries in the United States, but not all of these cemeteries are the same. Some cemeteries are state cemeteries, which require you to qualify for a burial plot. Here are the requirements to have a burial plot in a state cemetery.
Military Service
The number-one requirement to earn a state cemetery burial plot is to have some amount of military service that makes you or your loved one a veteran. State cemeteries have similar requirements for entry as national veteran cemeteries, but the eligibility will depend on the state. Regardless, you or your loved one (typically a spouse, but sometimes a parent) will need to be in the military or retired from the military in order to qualify. You may not qualify if you or your loved one were discharged under certain circumstances. You may have to check and see if the discharge disqualifies you or your loved one or not.
State Residency
Another aspect of qualifying for a state cemetery, as opposed to a veterans' cemetery that is run by the federal government, are state residency requirements. This simply means that you need to have lived in the state that runs the state cemetery you want for a certain amount of time before you can qualify for a burial plot. How long you need to live in a state to qualify for their state cemetery depends on the state — many state cemeteries do not require anything else but to be living in the state at the time of death or being born there.
Contact Your Local State Cemetery
The best way to qualify for a burial plot is to contact the state cemetery that you are interested in to see if you qualify. Many state cemeteries have websites, and application forms to pre-qualify. If they don't have websites, then you should be able to find their contact information in the form of an email or telephone number, or maybe even the location of their office so that you can physically visit. They can help you pre-qualify for their state cemetery, which can streamline the process down the line.
If you are interested in being buried in a state cemetery, then you should know how to qualify. Either you or your loved one will need to be military veterans, and you most likely will need to live in the state. Contact the state cemetery you are interested in to pre-qualify.
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