WASHINGTON – The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has awarded a grant of $98,564 to the state of New Jersey for improvements to the Brigadier General William C. Doyle Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Wrightstown, the most active state cemetery in the nation.
“By partnering with state veterans cemeteries, VA is able to honor our commitment to the men and women who have served in uniform,” said the Honorable R. James Nicholson, Secretary of Veterans Affairs. “This partnership provides a final resting place for New Jersey’s veterans that meets the high standards of a national shrine.”
The grant will pay 100 percent of the allowable costs for installation of an underground drainage system in section “L” of the cemetery. This section typically floods in periods of heavy rainfall and snow melt.
Brigadier General William C. Doyle Veterans Memorial Cemetery provided 2,669 burials last fiscal year. It is the only veterans cemetery in New Jersey with available space for casketed burials.
In fiscal year 2004, VA spent more than $1 billion in New Jersey to serve about 583,000 state veterans. VA operates medical centers in East Orange and Lyons with outpatient clinics and Vet Centers in several communities.
VA’s State Cemetery Grants Program complements VA’s national cemeteries. The grants have helped establish, expand or improve 61 state veterans cemeteries that provided more than 19,000 burials in fiscal year 2004. Five additional state cemeteries are under construction. Since the program began in 1980, VA has awarded more than 140 grants of more than $215 million to 32 states and Guam.
Information on VA burial benefits can be obtained from national cemetery offices, from the VA Web site on the Internet at http://www.cem.va.gov or by calling VA regional offices toll-free at 1-800-827-1000.
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Reporters and media outlets with questions or comments should contact the Office of Media Relations at vapublicaffairs@va.gov
Veterans with questions about their health care and benefits (including GI Bill). Questions, updates and documents can be submitted online.
Veterans can also use our chatbot to get information about VA benefits and services. The chatbot won’t connect you with a person, but it can show you where to go on VA.gov to find answers to some common questions.
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