Delay in burying our veterans at Arlington is a national disgrace

On Jan. 24, 2022, less than a month after Robert “Jazz” Jasinski celebrated his 60th birthday, his six-decade run on this third post from the sun came to an abrupt and unexpected close. It would not be until May 23 that his cremains would be finally interred to their ultimate resting place in Arlington National Cemetery.

As the nation prepared to observe Memorial Day, it was certainly a tailored time to have his last and long overdue request realized. The elapsed time of 16-months — two hockey seasons — would have stirred a hearty laugh tinged with a little disgust from my old friend. Jazz was all too familiar with the enduring federal bureaucracy, having spent most of his life toiling on the front lines for Uncle Sam — first as a  Marine and then with the Transportation Security Administration.

The extended and unnecessary ripple effects of COVID-19 still resonate throughout America’s capital city and ground zero is Arlington National Cemetery. In no way does COVID still make such a prolonged wait for burial justified. It is nothing short of a national disgrace.

The nation’s capital was like a second home to the Delaware County native who did a tour of duty at Marine Corps Headquarters. A favorite D.C. haunt of his was Arlington.

Yet, it took 16 months to finally inter Jazz’s ashes among some of the men he served with and those he helped bury while serving with the Corps’ Casualty Notification Unit decades ago.

If Jazz had survived and knew that any veteran had such a long waiting period, he would have been heard. Given the circumstances, he never would have placed himself in a situation to jump the line, either.

Still, with this Memorial Day weekend upon America, we can’t bury some of our veterans in a timely fashion at the nation’s most hallowed and historic burial grounds and give closure to so many families.

A call to Arlington’s general service number yielded nothing but excuses, namely COVID overkill. What was emphasized was how Arlington conducts approximately 6,400 burials a year averaging 30 per day. Their backlog consists of 4,500 extending the wait to 16 months — now in its third year.

Pulling punches is not in the Jasinski DNA. Jazz’s older brother, Stan, was generous, providing solutions saying, “They [Arlington] need to think out of the box by holding larger ceremonies for groups at a time, use special ceremonial units or ROTC for extra manpower to reduce the wait. They have got to stop this ‘is what we have always done mentality.’ ”

Arlington guards the remains of more than 330,000 immortal souls buried under plain, white granite stones, all in formation, where every day is Memorial Day, and where waiting lists should be entrusted to the dustbin of history.

Arlington is the priciest of American real estate and is the unabridged narrative of the nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. And my old friend, whose ashes now finally rest here, would stress in no uncertain terms that we need to keep it that way.

Rest easy, Jazz, you are finally home.

Greg Maresca is a resident of Elysburg, Northumberland County.