JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Overgrown and forgotten, the Spires Brown Roberts Cemetery lies hidden in thick brush off West 33rd and Spires streets in Jacksonville. <\/p>\n
Neighbors say the neglected site, which dates back decades, desperately needs cleanup.<\/p>\n
Tanya Griffin expressed sadness over the state of the cemetery. <\/p>\n
\u201cI want them to clean it up,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Neighbors of the Spiers Brown Roberts Cemetery want to see the it cleaned up after decades of filing complaints. (Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n
Griffin remembers playing in the area as a child. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe were still curious about the stories,\u201d Griffin recalled. \u201cYou could actually see a couple of headstones as a kid.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, the cemetery is so overgrown that no gravestones are visible. Recent photos show it has been cut and mowed at times, but the fence remains worn down.<\/p>\n
Monday, News4JAX found an orange code enforcement notice that had been left on a rundown piece of fence.<\/p>\n
We reached out to the city, which sent us records showing they have received complaints about the property since 1997 and have issued more than $76,000 in fines for code violations. <\/p>\n
Griffin\u2019s aunt lives next door and says she has had to take measures to keep snakes out of her yard. Other neighbors have reported mice problems. <\/p>\n
Griffin’s aunt lives near the overgrown cemetery and said she has had to take measures to keep snakes out of her yard. (Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.)<\/p>\n
The most recent complaint was filed on Monday, and city code enforcement says it is working quickly to contract workers to clean the property.<\/p>\n
According to the city\u2019s property appraiser, the land is owned by a construction company. <\/p>\n
We are working to find information to contact the property owner to ask questions about the maintenance of the property.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt just seems like a forgotten place,\u201d Griffin said.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Overgrown and forgotten, the Spires Brown Roberts Cemetery lies hidden in thick brush off West…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23021,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[17724,502,116,118,117,17725],"class_list":{"0":"post-23020","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-cemetery","9":"tag-community","10":"tag-jacksonville","11":"tag-jacksonville-headlines","12":"tag-jacksonville-news","13":"tag-spires-brown-roberts-cemetery"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}