The Star: Cemetery issue a hot topic at draft plan hearing

Cemetery issue a hot topic at draft plan hearing

By JADE CHAN

A PROPOSED cemetery at the Ayer Hitam Forest Reserve in Puchong, Selangor, was one of the hot issues raised during the first public hearing for the draft local plan for Subang Jaya held at the Subang Jaya Municipal Council (MPSJ) complex yesterday.

According to state housing, building management and squatters committee chairman Iskandar Abdul Samad, who chaired the hearing, finding a suitable site for a new cemetery is a big headache because no one wants to have one within the vicinity of his or her neighbourhood.

“The proposal is for a 55-acre cemetery that will cater to all races and religions,” he said.

“We received a lot of objections against the cemetery.

“Those that were filed by individuals were heard today (yesterday), while those filed by a group of more than 1,500 individuals will be heard at the next hearing,” Iskandar said.

Iskandar said 2,139 objections focusing on 192 issues were submitted on the draft local plan.

The issues brought up during yesterday’s hearing included discrepancies in zoning and the duration allowed for the public to register their objections.

“Some individuals and companies raised the discrepancies as their land already had a commercial status or that their buildings had been in existence for a long time, but the plan stated that they were located in residential zones,” Iskandar said.

On the LRT extension project, he said it was mentioned but not discussed in detail as it was still awaiting the approval of the state government.

“Syarikat Prasarana Negara Bhd (SPNB) presented a briefing to the state executive council on the proposed route last month. They’re supposed to review our feedback and present the project in detail to the state executive council,” Iskandar said.

He said the state government expected potential problems on the LRT extension project, and that the related issues had to be looked into carefully as there were many things to be resolved.

State local government, studies and research committee chairman Ronnie Liu noted that among the pressing issues raised was the need for more secondary schools and land for places of worship for non-Muslims.

“We will look into the demands and see how we can resolve them,” he said.

Liu said the authorities would also look into the suggestion of having the draft local plans in electronic format or soft copies so that they could be accessed via the Internet.

Iskandar said the issues that were straightforward could be dealt with at the hearing, but the more complicated ones had to be referred to the state planning committee.

State tourism, consumer affairs and environment chairman Elizabeth Wong was also present at the hearing.

Yesterday’s hearing received a lukewarm response as only a handful of individuals and representatives of companies and associations turned up. The next hearing, scheduled for June 22, is expected to draw a bigger turnout from the residents’ groups.