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BATON ROUGE — Staff at the Louisiana Department of Veterans Affairs’ five veterans cemeteries will resume committal services effective June 9. For the safety of veterans’ families and friends, as well as the LDVA employees, guidelines from the Louisiana Office of Public Health and the CDC will be followed.

  There will be limited seating in the committal shelter during services. Additionally, there will be social distancing between individuals not from the same household in both seated and standing areas. All attendees and employees are required to wear face coverings.  Frequent use of hand sanitizer is encouraged and individuals who are sick should stay home. Families wishing to display floral arrangements on stands at the committal service may do so; however, all handling, placement and removal of the arrangements must be done by funeral home personnel or the family. Floral arrangements will not be transported by cemetery personnel to the gravesite at the time of interment. Families wishing to place a floral arrangement(s) (limit two) may do so after 4:30 p.m. on the day of interment or any time thereafter. These changes will be in effect until further notice. As a reminder, cemeteries will not accept floral arrangements for direct interments. If military services are unavailable in a certain area, veterans service organizations may be available to assist. Families may also choose to wait to have military honors at a later date.

Cemeteries’ offices are open daily from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. For the safety of the veterans’ families and each cemetery’s employees, only one family will be allowed in an office at a time and will require masks. If the office is occupied upon arrival, please wait outside or in a vehicle until the office is no longer occupied.  If a family does not feel comfortable visiting, assistance may be obtained with a  call or email.

  Veterans parish service offices are now open to the public. Many offices are open by appointment only, while others are only taking phone calls. Some remain closed due to building closures by local governments. For the safety of veterans and the veterans assistance counselors, only one person is allowed per appointment, and masks are required. Please visit vetaffairs.la.gov to use our Find Location feature in the upper right corner for specific office information.

  For more information about LDVA, visit vetaffairs.la.gov, email veteran@la.gov, call 225.219.5000 or find LDVA on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.