Ashley White says her mother only had the car for two months when a massive tree fell on it Tuesday night during a storm.
"All she heard was snap, crackle and fall and she watched the tree land on her car,” White says.
“It was a tall tree and it literally went from there all the way across [the street].
Friday morning, she looks at the damaged done. The car belonged to her mother.
“That's the rest of it,” she says.
The tree also partially fell on her car, she says, and it was only the beginning of their problems.
At the time of the storm, both cars were uninsured due to financial hardship. Last month, White’s mother made a difficult decision to pay the electricity bill over their car insurance.
“Around here we have to make that choice: we either want to live with water [and] electricity versus insurance,” she says.
White claims the fallen tree, which used to be in her neighbor's yard, was supposed to be removed.
According to Carrie Murphy, a spokesperson for Mayor Jean Stothert, the forestry division confirms the tree was marked for removal Aug. 4.
In an email to KMTV, Murphy explains trees on private property, even marked by the city as damaged or dying, have to be removed by the property owner and at his or her’s expense.
If the tree is on city property or in the right-of-way, the backend of a sidewalk that extends to the street, White can file a claim with the city clerk which would then be reviewed by the city’s law department, Murphy wrote in the email.
While crews did remove the tree out of the street, White says there is still debris in the roads.
“I noticed north Omaha is not a major priority and it's kind of sad. Because we're just as important as being out there or over here,” she says.
At 15th Street and Camden Avenue, people are dealing with a massive tree in the middle of the street, caught in between a cable wire, according to personnel from the city’s Street Maintenance.
They just put a new pole up and transformer up and started the power and there it is, says Dave Snodgrass, a landlord who also lives in the area.
“It's very frustrating. As a homeowner you work hard to get something cleaned up, looking halfway decent and of course an act of God is an act of God,” he says.
According to the city website, homeowners are responsible for trees in the right-of-way.
“With the taxes we pay in this town, you'd expect someone to come along and kind of help clean up the area,” Snodgrass says.
