Kentucky widow Janet Arnett faces eviction as highway expansion plan goes through home

A Kentucky widow is set to lose the home she’s lived in for over 50 years because a new highway project is planned to go straight through her living room.

Janet Arnett, 76, purchased the 63 acres on the Mountain Parkway in Salyersville with her late husband, Lowell, back in 1969, where they planned to settle down and raise their family, according to WYMT.

The couple lived in several mobile homes for the first 29 years before they constructed their current, permanent home in 1998.

Lowell died in the house in 2015, leaving Janet Arnett to take care of the property by herself for the last nine years.

The last phase of a 45-mile road transformational project through Eastern Kentucky is planned to snatch up the property, forcing Arnett from her home.

“This home and the land surrounding it, is being taken away from her- due to the Mountain Parkway Expansion and Eminent Domain,” Arnett’s family said in a statement.

“She is losing everything.”

The Magoffin-Floyd segment is planned to create a “four-lane, undivided, limited access highway that spans from US 460 in Salyersville (Magoffin County) to KY 404 in Prestonsburg (Floyd County)” according to the project’s website.

Arnett was initially told she might lose part of her property to the project, but current renderings have the new highway going straight through her home.

“Yes, they are ‘buying’ it from her. But, she doesn’t care about the money. She wants to live her remaining years in her home,” Arnett’s daughter, Lanessa DeMarchis, said in the statement.

While the home doesn’t look large in pictures, it means much more to Arnett.

“It’s a small house, but to me it’s a mansion,” the frustrated homeowner told WYMT.

Arnett’s family says her home was the gathering place for family events, where memories were made over the years.

“When I was growing up, Mamaw’s house was always this place of refuge,” Arnett’s granddaughter Zoe Parker told the outlet. “We cooked together. And this is where I grew up playing in the creek, catching crawdads, and catching lightning bugs.”

“This was our epicenter of our family. And Mamaw’s house will always be Mamaw’s house- whether it’s right where it is or it’s down near the road- but it’s tough if Mamaw’s house gets bulldozed,” Parker added.

The family says they want to see improvements to the local infrastructure that will help the “honest, loving, genuine people,” but not when it affects their beloved grandmother.

“I mean, if I want to build the road, that’s fine. But just leave me alone. Build it in front of me; build it behind me. You know, I just want to stay at my house. Here,” Arnett told the outlet. “Why did it have to come through my house?”

“Our mom/mamaw has become collateral damage in this process. It’s not fair,” the family statement read.

Arnett’s proposition to move the road in front or behind her home was waved off, after officials claimed developmental and structural issues prevented any other configuration, according to the outlet.

The family has sent pleas to officials all over the state, including to Gov. Andy Beshear’s office, but they feel they haven’t been heard enough.

A petition was created by Parker, to raise awareness to the local politicians as she tries to keep her grandmother’s home intact.