People have a problem with death—which is odd, really, because other than being born, dying is one of the very few things that we will all experience as human beings. Yet it is only whispered about, if it is discussed at all. We fear it, so we ignore it. Then, when the last breath arrives, we are staggered by the hurt and ill-equipped to manage the obligations that come with laying a loved one to rest.

It is during the liminal hours between the end and the what-needs-to-happen-next—a bleary, anguished, disorienting time—that many of us first encounter the funeral industry. In those vulnerable moments, we often blindly trust a stranger to take possession of our mother or grandfather or husband or daughter and handle our person with compassion and dignity. Most of the time, that is exactly what happens. However, in Colorado, we have recently learned that “most of the time” isn’t nearly often enough.

5280 October 2024
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Over the past six years, four national-news-making instances of improper, and often criminal, conduct at Colorado funeral homes have come to light. In Montrose, a funeral home operator promised hundreds of families that she would cremate their loved ones but instead sold their body parts. In Leadville, a mortuary owner commingled cremated human remains. In Penrose, a funeral home left nearly 200 bodies to decompose instead of cremating them. And in Denver, a corpse and the cremains of at least 30 people were found at the onetime residence of a former funeral director. After each of these grisly discoveries, news outlets, law enforcement officials, and state legislators pointed to one notable fact: Colorado is the only state in the nation that, right now, does not require its funeral industry practitioners to be licensed.

Since 1983, when the state’s General Assembly terminated the 70-year-old Board of Mortuary Science, funeral service professionals—funeral directors, embalmers, cremationists—have not been required to pass a criminal background check, graduate from an accredited mortuary science program, obtain any official certification, or pass relevant portions of the national board exam. “There are a lot of people in Colorado who don’t know what they’re doing,” says Javan Jones, who owns funeral homes and crematories in Brush, Wray, and Fort Morgan, went to mortuary science school in Georgia, and is a former president of the Colorado Funeral Directors Association. “This is a skill set. Embalming is a surgery. My personal opinion is schooling and licensure are important. Families under stress should be taken care of by licensed professionals.”

Fremont County coroner Randy Keller, right, at the Return to Nature Funeral Home, where more than 100 bodies have been improperly stored, on Oct. 7, 2023, in Penrose, Colorado. Photo by Parker Seibold/the Gazette via AP

Not everyone agrees: The funeral industry in this country had historically been dominated by family operations, where parents taught the next generation the skills they deemed necessary to take over the business. That changed as states began requiring formal education for licensure. But for the past four decades in Colorado, people have been free to learn from whoever may have been willing to pass on the knowledge. Peter Morley, co-owner of Lakewood’s Stork-Morley Funerals and Cremation, has been doing the job for more than 25 years without a degree. “I learned how to embalm by learning from others,” he says. “But I did get certifications—certified funeral director (CFD) and certified embalming technician (CET)—from the Colorado Funeral Directors Association.”

Still, Morley realizes that recent events have shaken Coloradans and understands why his peers and state legislators introduced a pair of bills during the 2024 legislative session that sought not only to license practitioners, but also to allow state regulators to more robustly inspect funeral homes. Governor Jared Polis signed the bills—HB 24-1335 and SB 24-173—into law in late May. Although both laws are technically active, the state Department of Regulatory Agencies is still sorting out how to implement them, and current death-care professionals have until January 2027 to apply for licenses.

Licenses and inspections can only do so much, though. “These new laws won’t stop bad things from happening,” says Joe Walsh, president of the Colorado Funeral Directors Association and owner of Aurora’s 5280 Cremation Services. “It might keep some of the folks who shouldn’t be in the industry out, but bad people do bad things, regardless.”

With that in mind—and with several years to go before licensing fully goes into effect—we asked local funeral professionals how Coloradans can better navigate an industry that most people don’t think about until they desperately need its services. Their guidance extended beyond the how-tos for selecting a funeral home you can trust to offering sage advice on the need to change the culture surrounding the end of life. “If we can bring conversations surrounding death out from behind closed doors,” says Emily B. Miller, owner of Colorado Burial Preserve, a natural burial cemetery in Florence, “then we can all make better decisions about loved ones’ deaths and our own deaths. If we can bring death out of the shadows, then some of the bad things that have happened might not happen so easily again.”

Get Involved: State agencies use a formal rulemaking process to create regulations to implement legislation. The process ensures that stakeholders can comment on proposed rules and that the public is informed of the rules before they take effect. During October and November, DORA will hold rulemaking sessions for SB 24-173 and HB 24-1335. To learn about the sessions, sign up for the Colorado Office of Funeral and Mortuary Science Services’ updates.

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Timeline of the Funeral Industry

More than 110 years ago, in the interest of public health, Colorado created requirements for embalmers. Seven decades later, the state eliminated them. Recent events have prompted new rules.

  • 1913: The Colorado State Board of Embalming Examiners forms to ensure unqualified people don’t perform inadequate embalming practices that can transmit infectious diseases, especially smallpox.
  • 1968: The board, now called the Board of Mortuary Science, is placed within the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA).
  • 1977: A report from the Office of the State Auditor says the board has become irrelevant because smallpox had been eradicated. The report also states that the board had not adequately protected consumers and that license renewal was a revenue-generating procedure instead of a way to prove licensee competence. The audit suggests the board be disbanded.
  • 1983: The Colorado General Assembly terminates the board and licensure.
  • 1990: The Colorado Funeral Directors and Embalmers Association asks DORA to reinstate regulation of funeral practitioners. DORA declines, saying there had been no pattern of widespread abuse and that claims Coloradans had suffered—or might suffer—harm due to a lack of trained funeral practitioners were unsupported.
  • 2002: Members of the Colorado House of Representatives submit an application to reinstate the board to DORA for review. The proposal is denied.
  • 2006: A bill to license death-care workers passes the General Assembly; however, at the behest of DORA officials and funeral industry lobbyists, Governor Bill Owens vetoes the legislation.
  • 2007: Under its new name, the Colorado Funeral Directors Association once again applies to DORA. The proposal says that because Colorado remains the only state with no direct regulation of the funeral service industry, practitioners who have faced sanctions in other states are relocating to Colorado. The application is denied.
  • 2009: The General Assembly adopts a registration requirement for death-care businesses and provides title protection to practitioners.
  • 2011: Legislators legalize alkaline hydrolysis—often called water cremation or aquamation.
  • 2018: As a result of a Western Slope funeral home selling human body parts without permission, legislators pass a bill that regulates nontransplant tissue banks in the state.
  • 2021: A bill that allows the natural reduction of human remains—sometimes called human composting—passes the General Assembly.
  • 2022: Lawmakers pass a bill that allows regulators to conduct unannounced inspections of funeral homes and crematories during typical business hours. Up until this point, DORA could investigate complaints related to registered funeral homes but did not have the authority to physically inspect facilities.
  • 2024: Legislators pass HB 24-1335—which strengthens inspections of funeral industry operations—and SB 24-173, a law that will require people to be licensed to practice as funeral directors, mortuary science practitioners, embalmers, cremationists, or natural reductionists.

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2 New Laws That Will Remake Colorado’s Funeral Industry

Senate Bill 24-173

The Pertinent Parts: SB 24-173 mandates that an individual obtain a license to practice as a funeral director, a mortuary science practitioner, an embalmer, a cremationist, or a natural reductionist. To get that license, an applicant must pass a background check and meet the requirements for each area of practice; these vary slightly but typically include graduating from an accredited mortuary science school or receiving official certifications from an approved association, passing relevant parts of a national board exam, and receiving workplace learning for a year or longer.

What It Means For Coloradans: By January 1, 2027, anyone working as a funeral services practitioner in the state will be licensed. The law also establishes grounds for disciplining an applicant or license holder and authorizes DORA to take corrective actions, which would become publicly available to consumers savvy enough to check DORA’s website before selecting a funeral home or crematory.

House Bill 24-1335

The Pertinent Parts: HB 24-1335 requires routine inspections of the state’s 311 funeral homes and crematories, a task that will fall to DORA inspectors. Two new dedicated inspectors can now execute checkups outside of typical business hours as well as for a time period after a funeral home has ceased operations.

What It Means For Coloradans: Like businesses in many other service industries, funeral homes and crematories will be regularly scrutinized for best practices by regulators. In the same way a restaurant can be evaluated for cleanliness and food safety by the Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment, funeral homes will now be assessed by DORA to make sure they are up to code.

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4 Colorado Funeral Home Operators That Committed Deplorable Acts

And magnified the grief of hundreds of Colorado families. Here’s what happened—and where those cases stand now.

1. Sunset Mesa Funeral Home

Photo by Rick Wilking/Reuters Pictures
  • Where: Montrose
  • When: 2018

Case File: Between 2010 and 2018, Megan Hess and Shirley Koch—the daughter-and-mother team behind Sunset Mesa Funeral Home—promised hundreds of families that they would cremate their loved ones. Instead, Hess and her mother, without permission, disarticulated the bodies and sold the parts to body broker services, which work with medical research or educational institutions to provide human tissue for anatomy classes. Hess would then deliver fake cremains—often a mixture of cement—to the families. In 2018, the FBI raided the funeral home after receiving tips about illegal activities.

Outcome: Hess and Koch pleaded guilty to mail fraud and aiding and abetting. In January 2023, the women were sentenced to 20 and 15 years in prison, respectively; however, in July, an appeals court ruled that the original judge did not follow sentencing guidelines appropriately. The defendants will be resentenced in February.

2. Bailey-Kent Funeral Home

Photo courtesy of Google Earth
  • Where: Leadville
  • When: 2021

Case File: Former Lake County coroner Shannon Kent was arrested in February 2021 after investigators found an unrefrigerated body, unlabeled cremains, and an abandoned stillborn infant at his funeral homes in Silverthorne, Gypsum, and Leadville. Kent and his wife, who also worked in the business, were charged with abuse of a corpse and other misconduct related to their handling of another decedent. A jury found the couple not guilty on those charges, but Kent was subsequently charged—and pleaded guilty to—unlawful acts related to mixing the cremated remains of a stillborn child with those of at least one other person.

Outcome: Kent surrendered his permits to operate funeral homes, including others in Fairplay, Buena Vista, and Idaho Springs, in 2020 and was ultimately sentenced to 180 days in jail.

3. Return to Nature Funeral Home

Photo by Parker Seibold/the Gazette via AP
  • Where: Penrose
  • When: 2023

Case File: After the county coroner and then Penrose residents complained about goings-on—including a foul smell—at Return to Nature, the FBI discovered in October 2023 that owners Jon and Carie Hallford had left more than 190 improperly stored bodies inside their funeral home. Investigators said the bodies were left to decay without refrigeration, that some were found stacked on top of one another, and that it appeared some of the bodies had been there for four years. As of early September, several bodies had yet to be identified.

Outcome: The Hallfords appeared in court in April; they’re facing more than 250 state counts including abuse of a corpse, money laundering, theft, and forgery. State prosecutors have offered a plea deal—in which Jon would serve a 20-year sentence and Carie somewhere between 15 and 20 years—that the Hallfords have until October 4 to accept. The Hallfords also are facing 15 federal charges.

4. Apollo Funeral and Cremation Services

Photo by David Zalubowski/AP Photo
  • Where: Denver
  • When: 2024

Case File: In February, police arrested Miles Harford—the former owner of Littleton’s Apollo Funeral and Cremation Services, which closed due to financial troubles in 2022—on suspicion of abuse of a corpse, theft, and forgery. Authorities found a woman’s remains inside a broken-down hearse as well as the professionally cremated remains of roughly 30 other individuals on a property Harford had been evicted from in Denver (pictured). Investigators discovered that Harford had given the deceased woman’s family fake cremains.

Outcome: At press time, Harford was set for arraignment on October 18. More charges could be filed then. In the aftermath of Harford’s arrest, Apollo customers were asked to contact police if they had information about Harford’s business practices.

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What Victims of Funeral Home Malpractice Want To Change

Grieving families say the hurt is inconceivable, but there’s anger, too.

Gregory Lowe can barely get the words out. He works at Ace Hardware in Montrose, so he knew what Sunset Mesa Funeral Home had given his mother wasn’t his father’s remains. “It looked like concrete patch when we opened it,” says Lowe, whose family was contacted by the FBI several years after his dad’s death. “We sell it at the store. Gray, ashy-looking stuff. I was like, What the heck? That’s not human ash.”

woman in house
Sheila Canfield-Jones. Photo by James Stukenberg

Lowe was correct. Instead of cremating his father as they were paid to do, Megan Hess and Shirley Koch had sold his body parts. The owners of Sunset Mesa had done the same thing with the body of 46-year-old David McCarthy Jr., a fact his wife, Danielle, didn’t know until the FBI called her in 2018, a little less than a year after her husband of 25 years suffered a fatal heart attack associated with Gulf War syndrome. Shelia Canfield-Jones, whose 38-year-old daughter was supposed to be cremated in 2019 but was instead found decaying inside Penrose’s Return to Nature Funeral Home in October 2023, says she had a hard time handing over what she had thought were her daughter’s cremains to the FBI. “The agent kept having to convince us,” Canfield-Jones says. “He was like, ‘You have cement in this urn.’ ”

Besides being able to understand one another’s grief, Lowe, McCarthy, and Canfield-Jones all have something else in common: They had no idea how lax Colorado’s oversight of its funeral industry was. And they were incensed by it. “It’s infuriating,” Canfield-Jones says. “There are a lot of good people in the industry, but it’s been so easy for the bad players to be bad. We needed to make it harder.”

With that in mind, McCarthy and Canfield-Jones became part of the push in early 2024 for legislation that would provide better oversight. In doing so, they learned more than they ever wanted to about the state’s mortuary code, regulatory agencies, the influence of lobbyists, and how it feels to compromise to get bills passed. They also both know that laws are never perfect and government agencies rarely function like the public wants them to. “The bills are a step in the right direction,” Canfield-Jones says. “They probably will need to be tweaked. And we need to keep track of the Department of Regulatory Agencies to make sure they’re doing their job. They are going to have to enforce these things.”

woman sitting by grave
Danielle McCarthy. Photo by James Stukenberg

McCarthy concurs, but she’s also interested in another potentially effective tack: creating public awareness of the funeral industry.

“Victimhood is tiresome,” McCarthy says. “Instead of being a victim, I want to get information out about interacting with the funeral industry.” The Colorado Springs businesswoman says she thought she was selecting the right funeral home for her husband, but she mostly followed the crowd in Montrose, a town with few options. “I don’t trust this process anymore,” she says. “I’ve now had to do it twice. Once when David died, and then again when we finally got his remains back. Even though they knew what I had already gone through, the funeral home I used the second time still tried to upsell me on an urn. I’m a capitalist, but it felt exploitative. They didn’t want me to watch David go into the crematory—there’s no law against that—but this industry can feel cloak and dagger. I had to insist. And that’s it right there: You have to advocate for yourself and tell them it’s going to happen how you want it to happen.”

It’s been several years since the FBI called him, but it’s apparent that Lowe still can’t believe that what happened to his father really happened. And, he says, it’s impossible to talk to others about the pain. “I mean, what can other people really say?” he says, adding that his mother is still grieving both his father’s death and the fact that his body parts were ultimately found in several states. “There is no punishment harsh enough for that kind of evil,” he says.

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What’s It Like Working in the Death-Care Industry

woman standing
Photo by James Stukenberg

A practicing funeral director, 41-year-old Faith Haug is also the program chair of mortuary science at Arapahoe Community College (ACC), which has offered a mortuary science degree program for 30 years. We asked her about her thoughts on how consumers should evaluate funeral homes and why she thinks education is important.

Editor’s note: The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity. 

5280: Not everyone says they want to work in a funeral home as a kid—how did you come to it?
Faith Haug: I was just drawn to it. I feel like people who knew me as a child would be like, “Yup, that seems about right.” Really, though, I like the skill set it requires: You have to know microbiology, chemistry, anatomy, counseling skills, logistics, business, art, religion. You also must understand grief.

What don’t most people understand about the job?
It’s a 24/7 career with no holidays or weekends. It’s a job that takes it out of you and often doesn’t give that much back. You have to focus on a grieving family that is never happy to see you. It’s money that has to be spent but not on anything that makes anyone happy.

Colorado hasn’t required a degree to work in the industry, but as the ACC program chair, we’re guessing you think schooling is important?
Going to school in anything gives you context. There is a level of proficiency that’s deeper with an education. If I wanted to dedicate myself to a profession, I’d want to go to school. Learning on the job can be good—and that will be part of the new licensing requirements, in addition to a degree—but in school you learn about how different cultures deal with death, about the history of the profession, about different forms of grief. Those things are important.

There was opposition to implementing licensure for death-care providers. What’s your position?
I’m in favor of licensing; overall, it will raise standards. But I am concerned about a few things. People who think that the state requiring a degree and a license is going to prevent things like what happened at Return to Nature are wrong. The owner of Return to Nature went to school. I also think that they’re offering too many different license types. It’s going to be a lot for DORA, which is an overtaxed agency already, to execute and administer.

Do consumers need to be savvier?
Yes, they do. And what I’d say is this: Don’t wait until someone is dead to look into your options. You need to be in a clear frame of mind—not under a cloud of grief—to make good decisions. If you have a 97-year-old grandmother and haven’t already chosen a funeral home and thought about arrangements, what are you waiting for? Call around, ask for references, read online reviews, tour some facilities, ask about qualifications. This isn’t unlike picking other professionals you need in life—a doctor, a real estate agent—but for some reason people don’t do their homework when they should.

What red flags should people look for?
If you ask to see the entire facility and the funeral home says it can’t, that gives me huge pause. If someone is dismissive of questions, that’s a red flag. If they don’t provide all of the services—like cremation—on-site, I’d want them to tell me very specifically where my loved one is going to be cremated and who is responsible for their body. If they hesitate or seem unsure, that’s a red flag.

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How To Pick the Right Funeral Home

Illustration by Armando Veve

The room is silent, save for the flickering of candles situated near the head and feet of the sheet-covered body. Jim Cohen lowers his voice to a near whisper as he explains that for people of Jewish faith, it is customary to burn the torches from death until burial. “Jewish people have a lot of customs surrounding death,” the president of Denver’s 88-year-old Feldman Mortuary says. “We assist with all of them.”

While Feldman Mortuary also welcomes non-Jews, it’s easy to see why this City Park funeral home would feel comforting to those who observe Judaism. And that’s by design. Funeral home operators understand that, like any other business, they must differentiate themselves in ways that draw a clientele. As such, mortuaries often specialize and cater to specific spiritual or religious needs. Religion and death have, of course, had a long association, but a belief in a higher power isn’t the only factor in how humans have learned to mark the end of life. Culture is a significant influence, too.

For more than four decades, Pipkin Braswell Funerals, Cremation, and Receptions has primarily served Denver’s Black community by delivering services that honor its traditions. “Our services are more of a celebration of life,” says general manager JaCobe Payne. “If it’s right for the family, we do a crowning ceremony that comes from a verse in the Bible, 2 Timothy, that talks about a crown being awarded to those who reach heaven. We re-enact that by putting a crown on top of the casket. We also read obituaries during services. It puts an emphasis on the amazing things people have done in their lives.”

Latina Funerals & Cremations similarly leans into the needs of Denver’s Latino community. One particularly important custom is that family members carry the casket on their shoulders to the grave. “The other part of it is that there’s always a loud band following behind the casket,” says funeral director Marisa Casillas. “It’s like a little parade for a few blocks. We facilitate that ritual. Most people don’t know that anyone offers those things in Denver.” Casillas says there are other considerations, too. “We do about 80 percent burials,” she says. “Even when we do cremations, there’s almost always a service. That’s just part of the culture, and we’re passionate about helping families follow those traditions from back home.”

That high percentage of traditional burials stands in stark contrast to Colorado as a whole, where 77 percent of final dispositions are cremations. The trend is illustrative of how even geography can play a role in how humans address death. “Colorado has a high rate of cremation nationally because it’s a very transient place,” says Rayanne Mori, owner of the Monarch Society funeral home in North Capitol Hill, which specializes in simple burial and cremation. “Why would you have a loved one buried here if you’re not going to be here in a few years? Cremains are more transportable.”

So how do consumers know if a funeral home will cater to their desires? “People need to ask,” Payne says. “I will never know everything about every custom or tradition, but I’m happy to listen and learn. Make sure the funeral home you’re working with has a willingness to learn and understand your needs.”

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5 Ways To Bury, Cremate, or Compost You Loved Ones

Illustration by Armando Veve

1. Traditional burial is what most people think of when discussing final disposition plans. Choose it if you:

  • Want to have a conventional funeral service, possibly with public viewing, and are OK with being embalmed, a procedure that drains the blood and replaces it with chemicals that temporarily preserve the body.
  • Are down with paying for the vessel (on average, prices range from $2,000 to $5,000), the grave liner or vault (starting around $1,000), and a cemetery plot (between $1,000 and $4,500 on average).
  • Don’t mind the environmental impact of embalming fluids leeching into the soil, the carbon emissions released when metal caskets degrade in the ground, and the fertilizers, herbicides, and water resources used on traditional cemetery land.

2. Green burial is as old as time immemorial, yet many modern cultures have moved away from the ashes-to-ashes, dust-to-dust practice. Choose it if you:

  • Subscribe to certain religious traditions—like Judaism—that do not believe the natural deterioration of the body should be slowed down by the use of embalming chemicals.
  • Would prefer a simple, biodegradable casket (starting around $700) or to forgo a vessel and instead be wrapped in a natural shroud (starting around $200) and tucked into the earth.
  • Like the idea of a reasonably priced option.

3. Cremation, in which the body is burned to reduce it to ashes, accounts for 77 percent of final dispositions in Colorado. Choose it if you:

  • Need to take cost into account; the average price for a direct cremation (no memorial services included) is roughly $1,600 in Colorado.
  • Don’t have a family cemetery plot and/or would like your family to be able to carry your ashes with them wherever they go.
  • Aren’t concerned with the heavy environmental impact of burning fossil fuels (28 gallons of fuel are typically needed) and understand that scattering cremains can actually be toxic to plants and animals.

4. Water cremation, sometimes called alkaline hydrolysis or aquamation, is a process in which the body is placed in a vessel with many gallons of water and an alkali and heated to 170 degrees to decompose the body in approximately four hours. Choose it if you:

  • Like the idea that your so-called liquid essence can be used as a fertilizer for your family’s flower boxes, for flower farms, and at nature preserves here in Colorado.
  • Want your family and friends to be able to keep or scatter your bones, which are reduced to a nontoxic powder after the aquamation process is complete.
  • Find it appealing that water cremation (starting at about $4,400) consumes only 10 percent of the energy that fire cremation does.

5. Natural reduction, often called human composting or terramation, is the process of placing a body in a vessel with four times the body’s weight of organic matter (often straw and alfalfa) and letting it decompose over several months to create soil. The service starts at around $9,000. Choose it if you:

  • Find the notion of returning to the earth—but in a more controlled environment—attractive.
  • Want your family to be able to use the resulting soil it receives (roughly 300 to 400 pounds of nutrient-rich earth) in their rose gardens or to plant, say, a tree in the backyard.
  • Desire a laying-in ceremony, where your family helps place the organic materials and any biodegradable mementos into the vessel with you.

More on Natural Reduction…

Photo Courtesy of Valuable Gem Photography

Carrie Davis’ 42-year-old husband decided he wanted to be naturally reduced when he was sick with leukemia. When he died in November 2021, she honored his wishes.

Andy was a ski bum and beer lover I met in Santa Fe. We got married in 2011 and moved to Colorado in 2014. I work as a forensic scientist, and Andy was the best stay-at-home dad to our daughter, who was five when he was first diagnosed with leukemia. He had a bone marrow transplant and was in remission for two and a half years before the cancer came back in August 2021. We’d never really had a conversation about what he’d want done if he ever died, but a friend of mine’s wife had died suddenly, and he told me he regretted never having had that talk with her. Bringing up that conversation with Andy was difficult for me. I didn’t want him to think that I thought he was going to die, so I brought up an article about natural reduction that we’d previously read in People—and I was just like, “So…what would you want done?” He said he wanted to be composted, and that was the extent of it. It wasn’t an in-depth conversation, but at least I knew.

He died in late November. He’d gotten septic, and it took him out in about 12 hours. Right away I thought, OK, I guess I better explore this human composting thing. It became a simple choice because the only funeral home offering it at that time was the Natural Funeral. I went to meet with Seth [Vidal], who explained the process to me, and I loved everything about it. It’s natural, great for the environment, and the body isn’t tied down to one place. What I didn’t realize until Andy was in his vessel at the care facility was how caring it all felt. Chris, Andy’s caretaker, would come talk to me when I visited. He would show me how rich Andy’s soil was becoming. On National Cheesesteak Day, I brought cheesesteaks, which were Andy’s favorite, to have a sandwich next to Andy with my daughter and one of my sisters.

Photo Courtesy of Valuable Gem Photography

A few months later, I got a full cubic yard of Andy’s soil. Through Arvada’s Plant-A-Tree Program, we were able to hold a service to plant a tree in a park near our house. We planted a blue spruce with some of the soil and then filled mason jars with the rest so that our friends and family could take Andy home with them to plant trees and flowers wherever they lived. The little tags on the jars said, “Start your flower garden with love.” I go to the tree to talk to Andy now when I need to.

Death makes a lot of people uncomfortable. But sometimes someone will ask me about how it all worked with composting Andy. I tell them we truly did have a celebration of his life when we planted his tree. We had Torchy’s cater it; we had kegs of beer; the wine ran out; and people stayed for an after-party. But the most important part was that everyone got to take a piece of Andy home. —As told to Lindsey B. King

More on Green Burial…

Photo Courtesy of Colorado Burial Preserve

Colorado has what Emily B. Miller calls an “embarrassment of heartbreakingly beautiful alpine meadows,” yet when the former funeral director tried to help a family find a local cemetery specializing in natural burials, she couldn’t. “There were no options,” she says. “Not one without lawn mowers ripping through, not one with a focus on restoration, not one with an emphasis on earth burial, which is the original answer to the question of what to do when there’s been a death.”

So, in 2020, Miller took equity out of her house to buy the land that became the Colorado Burial Preserve, an 80-acre green cemetery near Florence. On this parcel of headstone-less terrain there are few vestiges of a traditional burial ground. “The plots are marked,” Miller says, “but they blend in with the land.”

The goal is to care for the dead with minimal environmental impact. Here, bodies cannot be embalmed and must be buried either in an unsealed biodegradable casket or in an organic burial shroud. Without chemicals or steel caskets, the body decays quickly. Miller also welcomes remains from aquamation and terramation but only allows fire-cremated remains if families let her treat the ashes for toxicity. “All of this means this land is healthy and can actually be a gathering place,” she says. “I intend for this place to change how we interact with cemeteries.”

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FAQs on…Death

Getty Images

What does our culture get wrong about death?
“We have a culture that puts questions about the end of life behind closed doors. We distance ourselves from death and dead bodies. Part of the problem is that we immediately think: What do we do with this body? In natural death care, it’s about slowing down and spending time with the body of your loved one. You carry your people to their final resting places. You have the experience of digging the dirt, you can hand-lower the body, you plant new life that will be nourished by the person’s body. The ritual is healing.” —Emily B. Miller, owner, Colorado Burial Preserve, Florence

Do I really need a funeral or a memorial service or a celebration of life?
“A death is a very distressing situation. Death knocks us off balance. Having a ceremony, having some ritual, having some steps to go through, gives us more of a sense of control. And it really allows us to get in touch with our emotions. We need it to be able to process the death of someone in our lives. It doesn’t matter if it’s just a family dinner; that can be the ceremony. It just allows you to touch the feelings.” —Jamie Sarche, director of preplanning, Feldman Mortuary, Denver

What’s one of the most difficult things for a funeral home to manage?
“Figuring out who’s in charge. You’ll get someone saying, I’m the oldest child, I make all the decisions. That’s not how it works. If there are six kids, I need four of the six to sign for a cremation. I don’t think most people know you can prearrange your own funeral in Colorado; just put it in your will that you want to be cremated and say who gets the cremains. That way there’s no fighting over how the cremated remains are split up. I have had remains in the back of my funeral home that were there for a year waiting for the courts to tell me who gets them.” —Peter Morley, owner, Stork-Morley Funerals and Cremation, Lakewood

What is a GPL?
“GPL stands for general price list, and funeral homes are required by the Federal Trade Commission to provide one to family members immediately, even over the phone. There should never, ever be any surprises regarding cost. A funeral home can’t change costs after the fact or add fees that aren’t disclosed.” —John Horan, senior vice president, Horan & McConaty, Denver

Can I prepay for my funeral?
“About one-third of the families we serve have preplanned and prepaid. I’m accustomed to hearing appreciation from the survivors when preplanning has taken place. Survivors seem to appreciate that much of the decision-making has already taken place, the expenses for the goods and services were locked in, and that it was prepaid. I would add that setting aside these funds in Colorado requires compliance with Colorado law administered by the Colorado Division of Insurance. The funds must be placed in a trust fund or an insurance policy. I think it’s good advice that people prefund with a company that has a sterling reputation.” —John Horan, senior vice president, Horan & McConaty, Denver

Why is it important that Colorado law allows for alternative forms of final disposition?
“The environmental piece of these practices—aquamation and terramation—is core. Conventional disposition is bad for the Earth. We’ve all just been doing what our parents did. A body is whisked away, embalmed with toxic chemicals, placed in a lead-lined casket, and put in a cement vault. Cemeteries are toxic waste sites. Colorado legislators had an awakening, and now we have options. I know there is a natural inclination to embrace old traditions, but I think we need to ask ourselves some questions: What do I want to be done with this beautiful vessel that I lived in? Can I not leave a carbon footprint on the way out?” —Mike Reagan, CEO, The Natural Funeral, Lafayette

How is dying different in the digital age?
“We live in the time of social media and devices. People need to be careful about posting about a death on, say, Twitter. It might be your friend, but if that person’s family isn’t ready for the world to know, then you’ve added to their grief. Also, families often don’t know their loved one’s iPhone passcode. All those photos and last texts that a family might now really want, they can’t get to. I can’t tell you how many times someone has said, ‘If I just had that last photo we took together.’ ” —Kelsi Tesone Mathews, owner, In Memoriam Funeral Parlour and Crematory, Broomfield

Is embalming required by law?
“No. Colorado law states that a body simply has to be refrigerated or embalmed within 24 hours of death. If you want to be with your loved one for a few hours, you should. Call your funeral home and let them know the death has happened and that you’d like to sit with your family member for a little while.” —Faith Haug, program chair of mortuary science, Arapahoe Community College, Littleton

I keep hearing about third-party vendors. What does that mean?
“Some funeral businesses farm everything out. They don’t have their own caskets, their own urns, their own crematories, their own spaces for services. They don’t do their own embalming. What this means is that while you might like or trust the owner of that business, there are potentially many other subcontractors who you might know nothing about. There are closed-to-the-public companies—called trade shops—that just do embalmings and cremations all day. They don’t work with families. When subcontractors are used, it means that your loved one does not stay in the hands of that first business owner. They can be handled with little oversight.” —Javan Jones, owner, Schmidt-Jones Funeral Home, Wray

Why is dying so expensive?
“We’re like any other business; we provide a service. I pay three full-time staffers. I have a mortgage on the funeral home property. I have insurance. I have vehicle maintenance costs and special-use permit costs. I wanted an on-site crematory, so I had to buy a retort, which has fuel costs. And funerals are events; there are costs with organizing a final event. So, yes, funerals cost money. Even my own grandmother told me dying costs too much. I told her to start saving up.” —Kelsi Tesone Mathews, owner, In Memoriam Funeral Parlour and Crematory, Broomfield

Can I donate my body to science?
“Since 1927, the State Anatomical Board, located at the University of Colorado’s School of Medicine, has accepted donated bodies for the purposes of education and research. Today, we take in between 230 and 250 donor bodies annually, all of which are used by students in medical, dental, physician assistant, and physical therapy schools. Every body that comes here comes to us directly. They’ve consented and chosen to be here to help others learn. After a death you can call us, or visit the State Anatomical Board website to prearrange your donation.” —Kate Serr, administrator of the whole body donor program, State Anatomical Board, Aurora

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An Editor’s Note About Death

I’d never really thought about what I’d want my after-party to look like—until someone asked me.

Illustration by Armando Veve

Jamie Sarche doesn’t like small talk. She likes big talk. That fact became very clear when Jim Cohen, the owner of Denver’s Feldman Mortuary, asked her to pop into his office, where he and I had been chatting. After Cohen pointed at me and summarily informed his director of preplanning that “she doesn’t have a person,” Sarche smiled a warm smile and said something like, “Well, then we’ll take care of it with you.”

By “it,” Sarche meant my funeral. I’m 45 years old, I am healthy and fit for my age, and I don’t have any immediate plans to kick it. But as Cohen rightly pointed out, I do not have a spouse. I also don’t have any children. In other words, I don’t have the people in my life who might typically be responsible for the logistics surrounding my death if I live a long life. This wasn’t really a problem, Sarche said, because Colorado law protects an individual’s right to prearrange their own permanent going-away party. So long as the associated costs are covered and a responsible party—a lawyer, a funeral home director, a power of attorney, etc.—has your written-out wishes, not even a spouse can override them.

As the queen of preplanning at Feldman for the past 15 years, Sarche ignored the fact that I’d come to the mortuary as a reporter with a whole lot of queries and told me we should set up a time to chat. “Death sucks,” she said. “Embrace it.”

So, I did. In early July, I met with Sarche to do a preplanning session. This time, she was the one asking the questions. In characteristic Sarche style, it wasn’t small talk. It was a conversation about Death with a capital D. “Talking about death,” she said, “should be a foundational part of our lives. I fight against a culture that says we shouldn’t ever talk about it.”

But talk about it we did. She wanted to know why, beyond not having “a person,” I might consider preplanning. (I told her my grandmother had recently died and mortality was more real for me these days.) She asked me about my religion. (I don’t have one.) She wondered about my values regarding the environment. (I recycle, compost, and follow leave-no-trace principles like any self-respecting Coloradan.) She wanted to know if I wanted an obituary. (Yes, but only if I get to prewrite it like John Cusack in Serendipity.) She explained and then asked what I thought about flame cremation, water cremation, traditional burial, green burial, and natural reduction. (Probably water cremation but maybe natural reduction.)

Those were the easy questions. The most difficult line of inquiry centered on ceremony—as in, did I want one, and, if so, what would it look like? I have always been of the mind that memorial services are for the living, and that I’d want my loved ones—my parents, my brother, and my close friends—to do whatever felt right for them. That’s when Sarche stopped me: “Here’s what happens, though,” she said. “They can’t think. Their daughter has died. They will not know how to get their own needs met. This plan you make is for them.”

I now have a basic outline. It might change, but based on Sarche’s estimates, it would cost $5,627.50, which I could prepay in monthly installments of $75.97 over 10 years if I wanted to. (I don’t.) Here’s what my party will look like: No flowers. No church. No limousines. No clergy. There can be a hired celebrant, unless a friend wants to officiate. My body will not be at the service, which will be held outside on a hot summer day. There will be rum and Coke and lime wedges on hand. Then my family and friends will, whenever possible, sprinkle my bone dust in the ocean, preferably in blue-green Caribbean waters. So, yeah, that’s the plan. —LBK

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