Burial fees are not taxes, state's high court rules

By John R. Ellement, Globe staff

A Bristol County funeral director today lost his bid to ban communities from charging burial permit fees, which funeral director Paul F. Silva considered an illegal tax on the grieving.

A unanimous Supreme Judicial Court said the cities of Attleboro and New Bedford had the legal right to impose the fees, the revenue from which can be sent into their general funds.

Silva and his attorney brother, Martin Silva, had argued the fees were an illegal tax because the fees must be paid before a burial can be held.

But the state’s highest court ruled otherwise.

“The burial permit charges are regulatory fees, not proprietary fees,’’ Justice Judith Cowin wrote for the court. “These charges are founded upon the state's police power to regulate the disposal of dead bodies in a manner that preserves the public health, safety, and welfare.’’

Cowin also noted “although a municipality has no independent power of taxation, it may assess, levy, and collect fees when the Legislature has authorized it to do so, provided that those fees are reasonable and proportional.’’

The Silvas had won before the Appeals Court, but the SJC decision reversed that legal finding. The Silva family operates the Silva-Faria Funeral Homes in Fall River and Somerset.