Punchbowl columbarium to open soon
By Mike Gordon
Advertiser Staff Writer
After two delays during the summer and a $1 million increase in construction costs, the first niches in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific's new columbarium should be ready for use this month.
Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser
That's good news for the families of 300 veterans who died after the old columbarium ran out of space in February. Their loved ones have been in limbo, their ashes put in temporary storage until workers could finish the first 500 of the columbarium's 4,160 new niches.
The first 500 of the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific's new niches should be ready for use this month.
Gene Castagnetti, director of the landmark cemetery in Punchbowl Crater, said an inspector from the National Cemetery Administration is expected to arrive next week to review the work. Under the federal contract, He'e Inc. was required to finish the first 500 niches by the first week of December. The rest are supposed to be done by April.
Castagnetti said the start of construction was delayed in June, then in July. It finally began in September.
The job was more difficult than the government's original $1.5 million estimate, and further negotiations pushed the cost to $2.5 million, Castagnetti said.
"They had to re-estimate the cost to excavate volcanic rock," he said. "They had to dig out more of the crater rim. To do this job, we had to excavate into the lava stone."
The 300 cremated remains awaiting inurnment have all been given committal services with full military honors, Castagnetti said.
Families or funeral homes have kept the ashes. They will be placed in their niches without additional ceremony.
Assuming the inspection goes well, Castagnetti said he hopes to begin the process this month. He doesn't know how many families with cremated remains are waiting to contact the cemetery, however.
"We know there is a large group, but we won't have a handle on that figure until they call," he said.
It could take months of busy days to get everyone in their place, he said. "We are prepared to accommodate them," he said. "Things will run smoothly."
Janis Thompson of Kailua is counting on that. Her husband, World War II Army veteran William Thompson, died in June. Janis Thompson held a service, but there was nowhere to put her husband. She took him home and lovingly set the urn on top of her TV.
As difficult as it will be to part with her husband, it isn't right keeping him at home, she said.
Thompson has gone to the cemetery every two weeks to review the construction herself, often making the drive home frustrated by what she views as a lack of progress.
"He is sitting there and his maile lei has died," she said. "He has a little note from Washington recognizing him. And this is what is sad. This is not the resting place for someone who served his country."
Reach Mike Gordon at mgordon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8012.
