A Clarksville, Tennessee, homeowner says sinkholes that began on land owned by her homeowners’ association have spread into her backyard. She’s now pushing both the HOA and the city to do something about it. Kimberly Starr told NewsChannel 5 that there were no sinkholes on the property when her family first bought the home and moved in back in 2021. She believes the holes now opening in her yard are originating from a strip of HOA-owned land directly behind their lot.
The sinkholes have grown deeper and wider, Starr said, and new ones keep opening across the yard. One is large enough that she calls it a crater, and another nearly hurt her husband. She said he sank up to his knee when he stepped into that hole.
The backyard was once where the family liked to spend their evenings. She said she’s now too afraid to go out there. She stressed that the backyard is supposed to be a sanctuary, and she questioned what a homeowner is left to do when they can’t use their own yard. With the sinkholes in view, it’s difficult to say how the yard could best be utilized with the sinkholes dotting the property.
Starr has raised the problem with the HOA more than once, but their slow responses have more than frustrated her. She worries that the longer the holes go unaddressed, the more they’ll start to damage her property. It’s still unclear which party, the HOA, its management company, or the city, will end up putting together a permanent fix.
What Have the HOA and the City Said?
Starr said she contacted Timmons Properties, the company that manages her HOA, after the holes appeared. An engineer hired through the company came out to look at the yard, she said, but that was about a year and a half ago. Since then, she said, the response she keeps getting is that the HOA is working with the city.
NewsChannel 5 contacted the City of Clarksville about the situation. David Smith, the city’s street department director, said in a statement, “It’s been on our radar, and we’ve been communicating with the HOA.” Timmons Properties had not responded to a request for comment by the time the outlet’s story was published.
Why Does This Part of Tennessee See Sinkholes?
Sinkholes are a common feature of the karst landscape that stretches across much of Tennessee. According to Tennessee’s emergency management agency, karst forms where rainfall is plentiful, and the bedrock is carbonate-rich rock such as limestone, which water gradually dissolves. A sinkhole develops when the roof of one of those underground cavities grows too thin to support the weight above it, or when water widens a fracture in the limestone until the surface gives way.
Huge swaths of land in Middle Tennessee, including the area around Clarksville, sit on these soluble carbonate rocks, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That helps to explain why sinkholes turn up so often across the region. Once a sinkhole forms in this kind of terrain, it can keep enlarging as the ground continues to settle into the cavity below.
For now, she said, she’s willing to hire her own engineers. She’s still waiting to repair her property until the source of the sinkholes on the HOA’s land is addressed. Until then, it seems her yard may be practically unusable.