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<p>The owners of a distressed Plains Township cemetery lost a legal battle attempting to rid themselves of the property and recoup the $4,500 they paid to buy it from a 2005 tax sale, court records show.</p><p>This 6.08-acre cemetery, Good Shepherd Memorial Park on Westminster Road, has been criticized for maintenance problems for approximately two decades and includes a mausoleum that was condemned by township officials in 2015. Some relatives of the estimated 90 people buried there have paid to exhume and relocate their family members&#8217; remains.</p><p>According to court documents:</p><p>Cemetery owners Lawrence Lee and Viktoriia Evstafieva first brought their tax sale purchase to county court in August 2012, filing a petition arguing the property should have been tax-exempt under state law because it was a burial ground.</p><p>They also pointed to an old state law that says county courts may place neglected burial grounds that have become a nuisance under the care of the municipality.</p><p>They requested tax exemption for the property, a refund of property taxes they had paid during the first few years of their ownership, reversal of the tax sale and a refund of the purchase price and all costs associated with the sale.</p><p>A county judge denied the petition last June.</p><p>Northeast Revenue Service LLC, which was hired to oversee the county tax claim years after the 2005 sale, had argued denial was warranted because Lee and Evstafieva:</p><p>&#8226; Did not apply for tax-exempt status &#8212; a change that must be requested and is not automatic.</p><p>&#8226; Exceeded the statute of limitations to challenge a judicial sale.</p><p>&#8226; Had no grounds to contest the property&#8217;s tax status or eligibility for sale before 2005 because those matters involved property taxes owed by the prior owner, Westminster Memorial Gardens, Inc.</p><p>Lee and Evstafieva appealed to Commonwealth Court, which issued an opinion Tuesday upholding the county court decision.</p><p>The statute of limitations to contest tax sale purchase is six months, and Lee and Evstafieva filed their petition seven years after buying the property at the 2005 sale, the court said. The Commonwealth Court also said there is no evidence the owners applied for tax-exempt status or an assessment reduction. The court cannot legally grant tax-exempt status retroactively, it said.</p><p>Township Commissioner Robert Sax has said the township does not have the financial resources to take on such a project, which could include tearing down the mausoleum and relocating those buried inside.</p><p>The property was previously owned by Westminster Memorial Gardens Inc., but its cemetery registration had lapsed around 1990, court documents said.</p><p>Northeast Revenue plans to list the property in the September tax auction because Lee and Evstafieva, both of whom have addresses listed in Wilkes-Barre and Ormond Beach, Florida, owe $22,800 in real estate taxes dating back to 2010.</p><p>A buyer is not expected due to the liabilities. It&#8217;s unlikely Northeast Revenue would allow the property to advance to a final-stage, free-and-clear tax auction because properties that remain unsold in that sale automatically advance to a limbo pool of repository properties. County officials had advised Northeast Revenue to take this stance years ago after the repository started accumulating water detention basins and other scraps deserted by developers after their projects were completed, possibly leaving the county semi-liable.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">The Good Shepherd Memorial Park in Plains Township, which includes this condemned mausoleum, remains in limbo due to back taxes and other issues. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/web1_TTL030817cemetery3-2.jpg</photo0><caption0>The Good Shepherd Memorial Park in Plains Township, which includes this condemned mausoleum, remains in limbo due to back taxes and other issues. </caption0><photoCredit0>Aimee Dilger|Times Leader </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Jennifer Learn-Andes</p><p>jandes@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p><ins>For other local news stories, <a href="https://www.timesleader.com/category/local" target="_blank">click here</a>.</ins></p><p>Reach Jennifer Learn-Andes at 570-991-6388 or on Twitter @TLJenLearnAndes.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Court leaves property owners on hook for Plains Township cemetery