Washington, D.C. — Secretary of Veterans Affairs Togo D. West Jr. today announced that Poe and Associates, Inc., of Oklahoma City, was awarded a $568,000 contract to plan and design a new national cemetery at Fort Sill, Okla.
The 400-acre site at Fort Sill, provided to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) by the Department of Army, is projected to accommodate some 130,000 eligible veterans and their families.
Initially, the cemetery will have approximately 14,000 full-casket gravesites, 2,500 cremation sites, an administration and maintenance complex, entrance area, flag and assembly area, a kiosk—style gravesite locator, memorial walkway, two committal shelters, roadway and parking system, grading, drainage, fencing and landscaping.
VA currently operates 117 national cemeteries for veterans. Two will open this year — one near Dallas and one in the Cleveland area. The nearest VA cemetery to Fort Sill is Fort Gibson National Cemetery, near Muskogee, approximately 200 miles away.
Information on VA burial benefits is available from national cemetery offices and VA regional offices at 1-800-827-1000, or from the VA web sites on the Internet at http://www.va.gov or http://www.cem.va.gov.
Veterans with discharges other than dishonorable, their spouses and dependent children are eligible for burial in a VA national cemetery. VA also provides grave markers or headstones for the unmarked graves of eligible veterans even if they are not buried in a national cemetery. VA does not reserve space in national cemeteries prior to time of need.
