The cost of burying a loved one at Vicksburg’s Cedar Hill Cemetery will be going up.

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen Monday approved a new fee list for buying plots and using the services performed at the city’s 177-year-old cemetery that fronts Sky Farm Road.

With the exception of the cost of buying plots in the cemetery’s new section, the free increases are effective Dec. 1. The increased charges for plots are effective immediately and will be phased in over three years, Mayor George Flaggs said.

Flaggs said the decision to raise the fees was made to offset the cost of operating the city-owned cemetery, which city officials said costs an average of $450,000 a year to run and maintain. Some of the streets in the cemetery need paving, and the area has drainage problems.

According to a revised fee list released Monday by the city, the cost of one plot will increase from $240 to $300, and two plots from $420 to $480. The cost of plots will increase over the next two years, reaching a high of $500 for one plot and $680 for two on Dec. 1, 2016. Someone buying three or more plots will pay $500 per plot.

The current charge for plots are $240 for one, $420 for two, $775 for four, and $1,490 for eight.

Starting Dec. 1, the charges for opening and closing graves will go from $85 to $200 for adults, from $40 to $125 for children and from $25 to $100 for infants. On weekends and holidays, the charge jumps to $350 for adults, $175 for children and $125 for infants.

Vault burials are increased from $30 to $125 for infants to from $95 to $250 for adults, and higher on weekends and holidays. Any work on the graves done after 4 p.m. will be charged at an additional rate of $20 to $30 an hour. The charge for burying ashes at the cemetery is up $45 for children, from $30 to $75, and $47 for adults, from $128 to $175.

Disinterments or reinterments (removing from, or replacing a body in a grave), which were charged at a rate of $128 for adults, $63 for children and $38 for infants, have been increased to $750 for adults, $500 for children and $250 for infants.

The fee increases are part of an overall plan by the board to improve the cemetery and bring fees more in line with its operating costs. The fees were prepared by a cemetery committee of North Ward Alderman Michael Mayfield, landscape director Jeff Richardson and local funeral home directors appointed in July after a meeting between the board and the funeral directors.