Pictured is the Jordan Funeral Home in Sinclairville. Area funeral homes, like many organizations and businesses, have had to deal with new restrictions limiting the number of people at gatherings. P-J photos by Jordan W. Patterson

When Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that large gatherings were being limited to 50 people, funeral homes were forced to adjust. Now, gatherings in general were banned, which would have effectively restricted funeral homes from offering their primary service: funerals.

However, Cuomo clarified the ban and noted that funeral homes are allowed to offer limited family viewings going forward.

“If a family wanted to have a viewing and or brief ceremony to say bye, that’s allowed,” said Gary Kindberg, Lind Funeral Home president.

Kindberg told The Post-Journal that prior to Cuomo’s clarification, funeral homes would have to turn people away from their services. Kindberg said he was relieved recently when reached by phone about the updated information provided by the state.

“It is a relief because we value funerals and services and having an opportunity to say goodbye and for folks to be denied that was a little unsettling to us professionally and personally,” Kindberg said. Prior to Cuomo’s directive limiting all gatherings, funeral homes had to abide by the 50-person limit on large gatherings. Additionally, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention recommended limiting gatherings to 10 people.

Cuomo also announced that 100% of employees non-essential businesses remain home.

“We are exempt because are an essential industry as far as our workforce, but we are not exempt in terms of limitations of the number of people that can be in our building,” Kindberg said.

Services have now been limited to holding private, limited viewings with immediate family which began last week. Kindberg said funeral homes and directors want to be sympathetic to families that are grieving but are still looking to limit the number of people inside a building at one time.

“It’s a challenge,” Kindberg said of adapting to the continually changing restrictions.

For Howie Van Rensselaer, owner of Van Rensselaer & Son Funeral in Randolph, his staff has had to get creative to adhere to recent restrictions. On top of making hand sanitizer available and surveying patrons ahead of time to determine if they were sick, one funeral service had utilized live streaming to accommodate a grieving family.

“We’ve had to adapt, certainly,” said Van Rensselaer. “I did Facebook Live for a funeral the other day because we were restricted to 50 people in the funeral home.”

Additionally, one funeral service was limited to 10 people at a time inside the funeral home. Van Rensselaer said he also instituted a questionnaire for people to answer before they were admitted in addition to other hygienic methods.

“We made them use our hand sanitizer before they went to see the family and again when they came out and we were the only ones opening doors for people so no one was contaminating that and about every 10 minutes we were cleaning the handles on the bathroom doors and things like that,” he said. “We were doing our due diligence so funeral homes don’t get shut down.”