2 Jan 24

WNY National Cemetery Council, Inc. Web Site Narratives

HISTORY By Patrick W Welch, PhD, Marine Corps Vietnam Veteran

The quest to bring a National Cemetery in Western New York began in early 2004. The late Lou Palma, a WWII, Korea and Vietnam Veteran, asked Patrick Welch, a Vietnam Veteran to meet to discuss the idea of a National Cemetery for WNY. At that time the closest national cemetery was in Bath, NY 110 miles away.

We established a working committee of veterans across the 8 counties of WNY and out to Rochester to explore what the requirements were and the steps to achieve this goal. The biggest issue was the veteran population requirement that we did not meet.

Meetings over a couple of years were held with members of the WNY Congressional Delegation to see if we could get their support.

Reaction to our request was tepid at best so we had to rethink our approach. We decided to start a petition drive to gauge the

support across the community. Petitions were distributed to veterans’ organizations, community organizations, we had a table at various

public events, anywhere where we could meet people and get signatures. The public response was great as we collected almost 11,000

signatures!

The NYS Senators and Assembly Members used to hold a semi-annual Town Hall type meeting and at one meeting Senator Schumer was a guest speaker. Our group attended that meeting and presented boxes of these petitions to Senator Schumer. Needless to say, that got the attention of all the elected individuals. Follow up calls and meetings were held with Senator Schumer and the other Congressional delegation. The breakthrough finally came when Senator Schumer advised us that he would support this initiative, finally we had our champion.

He and his staff vigorously began working on the requirements issue around veteran population and through legislation

the population requirement was reduced to a level that we met. Then several years looking for enough land to build a cemetery was begun,

then cost proposals, then funding proposals, congressional approval and all the other issues related to making it a reality.

After 16 years of advocacy on 20 December 2020 the WNY National Cemetery was opened.

Unfortunately, my dear friend and mentor, Lou Palma did not live to see it.

WNY National Cemetery History