FRANKFORT, Ky. (LEX 18) — A Frankfort family has been living in a camper outside their flood-damaged home since April, frustrated by what they describe as slow progress on repairs.
James and Deloris Thornsberry, along with Deloris' 82-year-old mother Nancy Hays, have been displaced since flooding destroyed their Kentucky Avenue duplex earlier this year. Their 17-year-old daughter, Audrey, and Nancy are staying with friends and family while the Thornsberrys remain in a pop-up camper with no running water or appliances.
"I have to go to my sister's to take a shower...and when we can't do that, you do a hot water rinse off," Deloris Thornsberry said.
The family has endured summer heat and humidity without air conditioning, and safety concerns plague their temporary living situation.
"The door to my pop-up doesn't shut or lock properly, so I'm afraid to go to sleep at night because I'm afraid somebody is going to get us," Thornsberry said.
"We just are lost for words for what we're going through," she added.
The Thornsberrys signed a contract with Central Kentucky Restoration to repair their home shortly after the April flooding that destroyed nearly all their possessions. They say insurance approval took time, but they finally made an initial payment of $100,000 to the company just before the Fourth of July weekend.
Since then, the family believes progress has been inadequate.
"They send a crew, two or three people, two or three hours, every once in a while," Nancy Hays said.
Without a clear timeline, the family remains in limbo, unsure when they'll be able to return home.
"This is ridiculous, enough is enough, I don't want to be in here anymore. I want to be home. This is my daughter's senior year," Deloris Thornsberry said.
LEX 18 contacted Central Kentucky Restoration about the project timeline, and they confirmed receiving the family's insurance approval on June 23 and the early July payment. The company stated an electrical inspection is planned for next Thursday, and they expect the project to be completed in 4 to 6 weeks.
Further, the contractor told LEX 18 that the company informed Hays that their could possibly be an insurance delay as Kentucky has seen statewide insurance delays with outside and third party carriers.
The company added that insurance approval was needed and that the $100,000 payment was to "fully cover the mitigation process that was already done and partially to cover the beginning of repairs. Being a small business, we cannot do work without knowing the project is going to be covered."
The company said that the only contract that was signed by Hays was a work authorization — an approval to work and to submit to insurance so payment can be processed. The company detailed to LEX 18 that work cannot begin "until the insurance company allows and approves the scope of work needed or else the homeowner is on the hook for the cost."
