Section 8301.5 Of Article 2. Rules And Regulations From California Health And Safety Code >> Division 8. >> Part 3. >> Chapter 2. >> Article 2.
8301.5
. (a) Nothing in Section 8301 shall be construed to permit a
cemetery authority to discriminate against any person based upon race
or gender regarding the use of any property within the cemetery.
(b) The Legislature recognizes, however, that although
discrimination against persons based upon race or gender is
prohibited, there are strong cultural, social, and other proper
reasons for people to seek to continue association with certain
groups even in death.
(c) In the same way that a family may purchase contiguous plots to
ensure that family members will be buried in close proximity to one
another, and in the same way that a religious group may, similarly,
establish and operate a cemetery for its members, or that veterans
groups may establish and operate cemeteries for veterans, the law
recognizes that members of cultural, social, or other groups with
strong ties are not precluded from establishing and operating
cemeteries for the purpose of furthering their desire to continue to
associate after interment.
(d) The urge to associate even after death also stems from an
intense social and cultural need to ensure that people are connected
with their past, and also to ensure that the graves and surrounding
grounds are kept, tended, adorned, and embellished according to the
desires and beliefs of the decedent, family, or group.
(e) The Legislature also recognizes, that the creation or
operation of a cemetery for a particular group by necessity entails
some exclusionary aspects. However, the exclusionary aspects are
permitted only to the extent that the purpose and effect is to
include persons, as set forth in this section, rather than to exclude
persons based upon race or gender.
(f) Although it is, indeed, a difficult task to permit creation
and operation of cemeteries that may exclude persons that are not
within the social, cultural, or other group while also assuring that
the cemetery is not discriminating based upon race or gender, strong
public policy compels that we perform the task. To prohibit all
association limitations in the creation and operation of cemeteries
would certainly ensure that no discrimination based upon race or
gender occurred; however, it would be overbroad in that it would
preclude activity that is not so motivated and that does not have
that effect.
(g) Therefore, subdivision (a) does not preclude the establishment
or operation of cemeteries for the purposes set forth in this
section to the extent that, and so long as the purpose and effect is
to further a sincere and bona fide association interest, rather than
to discriminate against persons on the basis of race or gender.
(h) Nothing in this section applies to Native American tribal
burial grounds or cemeteries that, pursuant to federal law, are not
subject to state jurisdiction.