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Dollar General, city cooperate
to resolve
lighting issue
By STERRY BUTCHER
MARFA – The city’s code enforcement officer and contractors associated with Dollar General continue to work together this week on bringing the store’s outdoor lights into compliance with Marfa’s light ordinance.
The Dollar General opened a new store here recently with some fanfare and a very well-lit exterior.
Lights atop the building were appropriately angled down after Code Enforcement Officer Roger Amis alerted the contractors to an ordinance that requires lights to illuminate the ground, instead of the sky, or be shielded.
Amis conducted an evaluation and concluded the store’s wall lighting, called wall packs, also needed tweaking.
“The contractors are going to bring the store into compliance within a short period of time,” said Amis. “As for the wall packs, the wattage will be reduced in some manner. If that can’t be done, they will put a shade or shield to direct that light volume down.”
The contractors have been cooperative, he reports, and Amis has put them in touch with a lighting expert at McDonald Observatory.
The lighting issue should be resolved by mid-month, he added. Dedication is Saturday
Merced Cemetery gains an acre with donation of land
By STERRY BUTCHER
MARFA – A dedication to expand Merced Cemetery takes place at 1:30pm Saturday.
The one-acre addition to the cemetery is made possible through a donation of land by the Nancy Lynch Trust, which owns the ranchland that neighbors Merced.
“It’s been our pleasure,” said Jane Crockett, a trustee. “It’s the right thing to do.”
As the decades have rolled on, Merced has filled to capacity. Hundreds of our collective friends and relatives lay buried on that hillside. Mando Garcia, a Merced volunteer, had searched for ways to best use the space they had.
“We’d started to bury people in the aisle-ways,” he said. “Now we can open it up. This one acre will last us 20 or 25 years for our little town.”
Garcia and Crockett had been in contact for about the need for more cemetery property. Legal issues that prevented the donation in the past have now been cleared away.
“They’ve wanted for years to have some land donated,” said Crockett. “It’s not been possible until now.”
Jane Crockett and her sister, Carol Gilchrease, are the daughters of Nancy Lynch. They are members of the Brite family, which has a long history in the county. The three women will be present at the Saturday dedication.
Crockett will hand over a survey and deed to Garcia on Saturday. There’s still plenty of work to do for the Merced volunteers before the land is usable: clearing brush, cutting a road, moving waterlines, building a fence.
“I don’t know where all that is going to come from,” said Garcia, “but it will come somehow.”
He is deeply appreciative of the cemetery donation.
“We feel like they’ve really helped our people,” Garcia said of the trustees. “Marfa people are family. I feel very gratified.”
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