DICKSON, Tenn. - One mid-state senior says a local country club is costing her a lot of money, but she's not a member. It's what the members are doing that's hitting her hard financially and even has her scared to sit in her backyard.
Elizabeth Oakley from Dickson has lived in her Dickson neighborhood for 30 years; but the past four years she has faced hundreds of little, but costly problems.
"There's one where they hit up there. Here's another. I put putty in that," said Oakley as she pointed out holes in the vinyl siding of her home.
Pictures show the shattered glass of that window that happen not once, but twice.
Even today you can find Oakley picking up part of the problem she has been having for more than four years.
One after another, Oakley is picking up the golf balls hit into her yard from the Dickson Country Club.
Once she's got a handful they go into her special spot where literally hundreds sit.
She explained why she keeps them all as she said, "If you tell (country club management) anything, you're lying about it. So, I thought I would keep it to show I am not lying about their balls being hit over here."
Oakley's home backs up to the golf course, but her home is separated by bushes and a net.
Oakley says the first time it happened in 2008 the country club eventually paid for the repairs, but in April of this year when it happened again.
"They say they aren't responsible for it. They fix one window and they (yell) they are not responsible for it. They play mind games with you," said Oakley.
At 68-years-old and on a fixed income Oakley says the $125 she eventually had to pay for the repairs was financially hard.
But more so she worries about not being able to sit on her swing in her own backyard-- or allow her grandkids and great grandkids to play outside.
"If they get hit by one of those balls, it's over. I'm told they go 90 miles an hour," said Oakley.
NewsChannel 5 spoke with the general manager of the Dickson Country Club and he did not want to go on camera, but he did say he has been there for about a month and he hasn't heard of this situation. He says he will talk to the previous management company as well as the present to see what they can do to prevent golf balls from hitting Ms. Oakley's home again.
The Dickson Country Club's general manager says any damage done to Oakley's home by a golfer is that golfer's responsibility; financially.
He has asked Oakley to call the club as soon as a problem occurs so they can find who caused the damage.
