When the Cottages at Spillman Ranch brought its proposal before the Bee Cave City Council to add three parking spaces near the Spillman-Beck Cemetery it was clear it was going to be a very difficult situation for both the Council and the Spillman family.  The issue was that the extended Spillman family (cousins, nephews, nieces and aunts of Frank Spillman) asked the council to  “undo” changes made to the cemetery plat nearly two years earlier.   I have great sympathy for a family’s concern for burial rights, tradition and protection, but a City Council must operate under a presumption that prior real estate transactions were legal.  Otherwise, property owner requests could be held up indefinitely.

It remains to be seen if the Spillman family prevails in Court, but if  they do, of course, there will likely be a different outcome.  Mr. Patrick Garnett made the primary presentation to the Council on behalf of the Spillman extended family and was well-prepared for an argument before any Judge.   Again, however, the City Council was not the proper venue.   The family’s legal issue is whether or not the existing fencing around the cemetery reflects the actual boundary of the cemetery, per the law.  As I understand it, Mr. Frank Spillman placed the fence around the border of the cemetery 14 years ago when his first wife passed away.  It was not, however, his intent at the time to create any type of permanent boundary around the cemetery.   The extended Spillman family would like to see the fence built 14 years ago designated as the permanent boundary.

To complicate things, there is a boundary fence built within the fence built by Mr. Spillman.  It is understood that there are remains of family members buried outside of the original boundary, yet within the fence built by Mr. Spillman.   Accordingly, it is a complex issue rife with strong opinions either way.    Should the cemetery boundary be construed liberally or should you balance the rights of the property owner who created the alleged boundary.  Frank Spillman is in support of the plat as it exists and wants the parking spaces so that he can visit the cemetery for years to come.

Below is the article printed in the Lake Travis View regarding this meeting:

Spillman cemetery setback debated

Monday, March 22, 2010 | Devin Monk

The normally sedate, often empty public seating area at Bee Cave City Council meetings boiled over March 9 with emotions stirred by a development on land owned by the Spillman family that includes a private cemetery.

Some family members protested the city’s approval of site and nonpoint source plans for Ash Creek Homes that will allow the developer to build four parking spaces inside the boundary of Spillman Ranch Cemetery, also known as the Joseph Beck Cemetery.

The earliest recorded interment there occurred in 1893, and the most recent was in 2007. No remains would be disturbed or need to be moved based on the location of the parking spaces. Gravesites that are known to exist in the cemetery occupy roughly 10 percent of the marked cemetery land.
City ordinances prohibit building and paving within 20 feet of cemeteries, but Frank Spillman, who represented himself as the owner of the property, granted Ash Creek Homes an easement to build the spaces by dedicating the land and in return the developer granted the family an easement to maintain visitation.
The land is part of a 465-acre tract conveyed to Frank Spillman, his brother Henry Spillman Jr. and sister Golda Lynn Garnett out of the Spillman Ranch area settled in the late 1800s.
The Spillmans are intrinsically linked to the city, a bond symbolized by the historic Spillman House, several generations that have lived in the city and subdivisions that bear their name.
“We’re rooted very deep, and I’m very proud of Bee Cave. I think some things should be held sacred. I wish our heritage and our tradition had been preserved a little better,” Jodie Spillman Reed said.
The site configuration is based on a replat of 10 acres in 2008 at the southeast corner of Falconhead Boulevard and Gyrfalcon Cove in advance of a previous development known as The Villas at Bee Cave, which never materialized. The site is split into two lots — one to build 51 single-story condo units in the Cottages at Spillman Ranch and the other that contains the cemetery on Round Mountain Drive.
Additionally, Ash Creek Homes promised to perform landscape improvements and other maintenance upgrades as well as install a stormwater irrigation system around the cemetery’s perimeter.
“To me, that sounds very fair,” Frank Spillman said of the developer’s suggested improvements.
Council member Bill Goodwin initially expressed doubts over proceeding with site plan approval given some family members’ opposition, but soon realized that the city’s site reconfiguration in 2008 could not be undone.
“So what you are telling me is that we can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube,” he said.
Golda Garnett’s son, Patrick, cautioned the council on authorizing the site plan.
“If we are approving something on a parcel that has not complied with state law, are we really doing our due diligence?” Garnett asked. “I am trying to uphold the state laws regarding cemeteries — that’s my concern here — for our family’s preservation and our families future burial rights at this site.”
Nicholas Trierweiler, an archeologist that Garnett hired, stated in a letter Garnett presented to the City Council that, “Under state law, all land within historic cemeteries is dedicated land that may not be used for any other purposes… The dedication may be removed only by a court order and only upon presentation of proof that the land proposed for removal of dedication does not contain any human graves, whether marked or unmarked.”
Council member Bob Dorsett said when the council takes action or votes on items it can only act based on the presumption that all requests put before it are legal requests. It does not have the authority to challenge the legality of a development under state law.
“The big issue I see is that you are arguing a fight that is in front of the wrong group of people,” Dorsett said, adding that he sympathized with the family’s concerns for history. “This is 100 percent a family dispute that is not properly before us. It is not a decision for us to make.”
Garnett and Reed beseeched council members to table the item for two weeks to give them more time to sort out their differences of opinion, but council members said they doubted the issues could be resolved in that time.
Council members concluded the discussion by unanimously approving the nonpoint source and site plans for the development.