‘Faces of Idalia’: South Georgia family fights to rebuild family business months after the storm

VALDOSTA, Ga. (WCTV) – A Valdosta family is fighting to rebuild and recover months after Hurricane Idalia tore through South Georgia.

As part of our ‘Faces of Idalia’ series, WCTV spoke with Erin Michele. Her family’s business was badly damaged after the storm when a downed powerline re-activated.

This wasn’t your typical shop. It held decades worth of memories and priceless family heirlooms. A fight over the rebuild has left the family frustrated and fed up.

“This is property that wasn’t just damaged, it was destroyed,” said Valdosta resident Erin Michele.

A Valdosta family’s legacy destroyed not by rain or wind, but by a fire that sparked after the storm.

“There was a tree that hit the double wide, a small tree that hit the shop behind me, another tree about where I’m standing. I think there were three or four total. One missed both buildings completely,” Michele said.

Michele said a powerline downed by the storm and later re-activated ruined more than 80 years worth of memories.

“There was a powerline that had been hit by a tree and it was laying in the yard,” Michele said. “We let Colquitt Electric know that the powerline was in the yard. It was still attached to the pole but the pole was bent over more so than it is now and when they cut the power on, there was a short somewhere and it caught fire.”

The shop was built by Michele’s great-grandfather Dollar.

“He built church pews with his two sons and then they did cabinets for a while and he retired. He did construction and they used this as an office for their construction company. Over the years we’ve had different family members do different things,” Michele said.

Generation after generation worked hard to keep the business alive. Michele said the fire took so much more than a means of income.

“There were a couple boxes of pictures, a couple of my aunts and uncles have passed away and some of their stuff was being stored here. We had some family furniture that between everyone didn’t have a home at the moment,” Michele said. “I personally lost some childhood toys, those kinds of things that we would put up ‘til later.”

Michele said she wanted Colquitt Electric to pay for the rebuild, but working with their insurance has been a long process.

“We talked with Colquitt Electric’s insurance company,” Michele said. “First they quoted up $30,000. I believe that they went up to $40,000 and we hired an attorney and she sent them a letter and it took forever to hear back from them. That’s been one of the frustrations is that it’s been running a little slow, but they told us $50,000.”

Michele shared documentation with WCTV from Colquitt’s insurer, which estimated the “replacement cost value” at $54,000. But a quote Michele’s family received from a contractor carried a price tag nearly double that amount, at more than $100,000.

She said a lack of progress with insurance hits especially hard for her 81-year-old grandmother.

“It’s emotional for her because her father built it, she really doesn’t like looking at it,” Michele said. “It’s obviously not pretty to look at right now.”

Michele wanted to emphasize that her family didn’t ask for Colquitt Electric to cover the cost of the mementos from inside the building. The family only wants the shop to be rebuilt properly.

WCTV contacted Colquitt Electric multiple times for comment and has not heard back.

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