Vets see red over Rocky, cancel cemetery event

The Salt Lake City Cemetery veterans section looks good again, but some veterans and the people who did most of the work don't want Mayor Rocky Anderson's name connected with the improvements.

"I don't believe that he ought to get any public credit for that, because he didn't have anything to do with it," said Craig Moyes, chief executive officer of ONYX Construction.

Planning began this month for Anderson and others to hold a news conference on Nov. 7 to rededicate an area where more than 1,000 leaning or fallen headstones of veterans needed repair. That's when some bad blood from the past boiled again because of Anderson's public opposition to the war in Iraq.

"We need to rededicate those graves in a manner that's fitting for veterans there and not just have a press conference," said Johnnie Janes, chairman of the Utah State Veterans Advisory Council. Janes said that his group

would not participate in a press conference that involves the mayor.

Anderson said that he was asked to speak at the event by the city's public services department.

"I felt I was trying to be gracious," Anderson said. The mayor said that some people are confusing his opposition to the "fiasco" in Iraq with his support of troops and veterans, some of whom agree with his stance on the war.

Moyes, however, said it would be "hypocritical" for Anderson to hold the news conference. He asked where the mayor's interest was when veterans "repeatedly came to him for assistance to restore this section of the cemetery that was in shambles?"

Anderson said that he had not heard anything about the cemetery's needs until people began soliciting volunteers to help with the project. From that point on, he said, his administration has supported the project.

"None of these people ever came to me," he said. "And I'm probably the most accessible mayor on the planet. I can't read their minds. I think these people are just picking a fight because of my position on Iraq."

ONYX Construction and other area subcontractors donated more than $250,000 in time, money, equipment and effort to fix the headstones. Moyes said he had two crews at the cemetery for three months until August. Anderson said that city cemetery workers unloaded 50 truckloads of dirt and laid 30,000 square feet of sod for the project.