Recent Tornadoes Present Opportunities for Contractors
Marybeth Bergeron says tornado recovery will keep contractors busy for quite some time.
Although new-home construction long ago slowed to a crawl in the Pioneer Valley, Roger Chapdelaine said, remodeling business has been on the rise for some time.
“We’ve been doing a lot of work,” he said. “A lot of people are renovating; we have a lot of mid-range remodeling projects. The kitchen and bath business is very strong right now.”
And that was before a series of tornadoes tore through Greater Springfield on June 1, throwing hundreds of lives into turmoil and posing stark challenges to the region’s economy — but presenting a very large opportunity to those in the construction and restoration fields, who had already been seeing signs of life in a long-troubled industry.
“The tornado work has definitely increased our total volume, from the standpoint of knockdowns and rebuilds and also repair work,” said Chapdelaine, president of Joseph Chapdelaine & Sons in East Longmeadow. “We’re trying to focus more on the full rebuilds right now, but it depends a lot on what our clients need. But definitely, the increase in the workload has been something.”
That’s a story being repeated throughout the construction sector.
“I can’t tell you how busy we’ve been lately,” said Marybeth Bergeron, president of Charista Construction in East Longmeadow. “We’ve been in business since 1985, we have a good reputation, and we’re literally two blocks from East Forest Park, where the tornado hit the Hill McKnight section of Springfield. And we’ve done a lot of work in Wilbraham, too; our name is fairly well-known there.
“This work will continue for a period of time,” she added. “Frankly, there’s so much work that not all of it will be done in the next few months. It’ll take a year to get everything back into condition. Some homeowners are being more cautious, and they’re taking their time to make sure the job is done right, and make sure the right people are doing the work for them.”
While general contractors saw their workload rise in the days and weeks following the storm, property-restoration businesses were answering the call within hours.
“We probably handled more than 60 just emergency-type jobs — boardups, triage-type work,” said Joe Gillette, president of Complete Restoration Solutions in Chicopee. “We probably contracted for repairs on half of those, and we continue to get calls every day. People are still dealing with the damage.”
For a company more accustomed to responding to smaller emergencies — a house fire or localized flooding after a storm — the extent of the tornado damage posed a different set of challenges, Gillette said.
Gary Brunelle says his company was already busy with repairs from winter ice and water damage when the tornadoes hit.
The initial response, he explained, “ranged from boarding up windows and doors to tarping roofs to securing personal property and helping remove trees from roofs — everything you can think of to make it safe, make the property secure from any looters or further damage. Most of the major emergency stuff came within three or four days, but we got calls as late as last week.”
In this issue, BusinessWest spends some time with a few business owners with significantly less of it to spare these days — a silver lining for the construction industry amid a decidedly challenging time for the community as a whole.
On the Clock
Gary Brunelle, president of Ace Fire and Water Restoration in West Springfield, recalls working for 30 straight days after the tornado to deal with the flood of work requests coming in from homeowners and insurers.
“We market in the insurance industry pretty heavily, and when people call their insurance agents and ask who they recommend and what they should do, we get people calling all the time,” he told BusinessWest.
“We specialize in fire, water, wind, and mold, and that was a pretty good-sized windstorm, so we did get a steady stream of customers,” Brunelle added. “We did boardups and roof tarpings until June 18, so there were 17 days of what we call ‘emergency services.’ That includes sucking water out of people’s basements because the roof is gone, restoring power, and setting up demolition.”
If a property owner chooses to sign a rebuilding contract with Ace, the company negotiates a damage estimate with the insurer. “Then, because we’re general contractors, we come in and do the repair work that needs to be done.”
That has taken many forms lately, he said, from rebuilding two roofs in Wilbraham to rebuilding a house on Abbott Street in Springfield. “We’ve got one on Eastern Avenue where we’ll gut the interior and reframe some exterior walls, and redo the interior of the house.”
The uptick in business in Western Mass. echoes a similar phenomenon occurring elsewhere. The tornadoes that struck Alabama on April 27, destroying about 5,700 homes and businesses, have spurred a boom in construction following what had been a very weak year.
“Business is picking up because of this and a lot of our members are swamped right now,” Lurenda Avery, spokeswoman for the Greater Birmingham Assoc. of Home Builders, told the Birmingham Business Journal.
The situation in Joplin, Mo., where a May 22 tornado killed 156 people and destroyed or damaged some 8,000 buildings, is somewhat different, as the focus has been on demolition and debris removal, with a massive rebuilding effort expected to boost construction afterward. But even now, companies that provide demolition, debris collection, dumping, and landfill services are experiencing a surge in business.
For example, the landfill in Galena, Kan., just a few miles from Joplin, had been run by one man with a loader, but the town has since contracted with Joplin-based Jordan Disposal Services to manage the landfill so that it could handle the influx of tornado debris. Thirty people now operate the landfill.
“It’s a terrible thing that Joplin’s had to go through,” Galena Mayor Dale Oglesby told the Associated Press, “but a lot of people are going to have a job because of this. A lot of materials are going to be sold, and a lot of materials are going to be disposed of.”
Caution Flags
Clearly, large-scale disasters cultivate opportunities — and breed opportunism. One theme that has arisen repeatedly when talking to local contractors is the importance of hiring firms that are actually qualified to do the work (see related story, page 37).
“I think, for reputable companies familiar with the remodeling and mitigation work, there’s ample opportunity,” Bergeron said.
The emphasis she put on ‘reputable’ firms echoes a caution issued by municipal officials and local leaders in the construction trades — including tree-removal specialists and roofers — about a wave of unlicensed workers who typically try to make a few bucks in the wake of a major storm or other disaster.
“I believe the initial onslaught of out-of-state contractors who came in has somewhat dissipated,” Bergeron said. “The city of Springfield has done a fabulous job educating the public about the type of firms they should be hiring, about preferring local, reputable firms wirth licenses and insurance, about always checking referrals.”≠
There’s a reason for such diligence, she said. “We are able to negotiate and substantiate damages that perhaps other contractors without our breadth of knowledge might miss,” she explained, adding that her firm becomes a sort of partner with a home or business owner during a very difficult time.
“We work with insurance companies to make sure people get everything they’re entitled to under their policy,” she added. “Unfortunately, some people are willing to accept what the insurance company wants to give them without debate, and certainly there’s always room for debate when it comes to mitigation work. We’re finding that, as the weeks go by, people are discovering additional damages — windows with seal failures, small foundation cracks — that they didn’t realize initially, and we’re being called back to do supplemental claims for them.”
As Chapdelaine explained, the construction industry had been showing some signs of life already, with more homeowners opting for remodeling projects and many people still dealing with repairs of the ice damage sustained during the past harsh winter.
“It’s been a crazy year,” he said. “Between the winter and the tornado, it’s created a lot of work. But people were already upgrading their homes and starting to spend money. So I’d rather focus on the positive instead of saying we have to rely on Mother Nature to be busy.”
Brunelle also noted that Ace had been plenty busy with winter-weather repairs. He pointed to color-coded folders in his office representing current jobs — red for fires, green for tornado-related projects, and so on. There are plenty of these green files about, but a large stack of blue files (representing water damage) as well. “Those are all winter repairs,” he said.
“Some years are busier than others,” he added, “but this has been much more than we expected, for sure.”
Gillette agreed, noting that the company has been handling jobs in all cost ranges, and is busy hiring project managers and superintendents to keep up with the additional workload.
Chapdelaine also understands that urgency.
“The downside,” he said, “is that we certainly can’t take all the work, and you hate to put people off. The tornado was harrowing enough.”
Joseph Bednar can be reached at bednar@businesswest.com
