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After living for nearly 10 months in a tiny trailer without running water, electricity or a bathroom (unless you count the rented portable toilet sitting in her yard), Martha Ridings finally has a house.

It’s not just any house — this house was built by the compassion and love of neighbors, friends and complete strangers. And Ridings knows it could have never been built without them.

She held an open house at the newly-completed home Thursday to thank the people who made it happen.

Ridings’ original home on Blair Loop in Walland — where she had lived since Mother’s Day in 1977 — was severely damaged by a fire on Sept. 6, 2007. It was later discovered that the blaze was sparked by a Blount County Highway Department truck that hit a power line near her house.

The fire destroyed a building next to her residence, and smoke and fire damage made the house unlivable. That was when life in the trailer began.

Tennessee law limits property damage claims against local governments at $100,000 — far less than what it would cost to demolish the fire-damaged house and rebuild a new one. But after several months Ridings came to a settlement with Blount County, and the government cut her a $100,000 check, agreed to tear down the existing structures and clear the property for free, and waive the firefighting cost and building permits and inspection fees.

With $100,000 in her hands, Ridings started planning her new home with the help of people moved by her story of loss.

Ace Sandlin, president of the nonprofit Father’s Touch, said he read about Ridings’ story in the newspaper on a Sunday and contacted her the next day. That meeting pulled at him and he knew he had to get involved.

“When God tells me to do something, I’ve found it’s better to do it than take the beating later,” Sandlin said of his conviction to be a part of the project.

He got on the phone and contacted David Loy, with Loy Builders, who became the project’s contractor. Loy called in favors and got discounts on supplies and labor — and even had some work donated.

Contractors and builders were already struggling in a lagging housing market, but finding people willing to help was not a challenge, Loy said.

“It wasn’t hard at all,” he said.

On June 26, the house was complete and ready for Ridings to move into. The cost for a home that size could have easily been upwards of $130,000, Loy said. But the project was done — including landscaping, furniture, appliances and other household goods — for $100,000.

“Words can’t describe it,” Ridings said Thursday. “After you go through something like that, you just don’t see a way out.

“It would be impossible to name everybody who has come here and helped.”
Getting to this point was certainly not all roses, starting with the insurance payment from the county.

“I guess that’s one of the worst let-downs,” Ridings said. “Because I’ve always supported my government.”

The experience was eye-opening, and Ridings has decided to make it her mission to see the state law on local government property damage liability changed so others in her position don’t have to go through what she did.

“We’re not going to stop until the law is changed,” she said.

In the end, it was that money situation — and the perceived unfairness of it — that garnered so much attention and drew volunteers in droves.

Tona Monroe-Ball, who helped raise money for Ridings, was at Thursday’s open house.

“(Ridings) lived in poverty for a good long time, and it was completely unnecessary,” said Monroe-Ball, a candidate for state House of Representatives in the August election. “This is called the Volunteer State, and this is a good example (of that).”
Monroe-Ball, like Sandlin, called Ridings after reading about her plight. She was shocked to see how Ridings was living in the tiny 10-by-15-foot trailer.

But now, as Ridings stood in her new home, there was only happiness.

“I am thrilled for her,” Monroe-Ball said. “This is wonderful.”

Loy was just happy to have been a part of building the home — and to see the community pull together to make it happen.

“She lost everything,” Loy said. “It feels good, it feels real good. A lot of good people stepped up.”

Ridings agreed.

“I can tell them thank you every day for years, and I couldn’t thank them enough,” she said. “Thank you, and God bless you.”