HOUSTON – (By Dale King) – Before the first raindrop from Hurricane Harvey fell on the Houston area two months ago, before the first gust of wind tore away a wall, uprooted a tree or ripped a roof in Key West on Sept. 10, and even before Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico and nearby islands, Fort Worth-based disaster recovery company Interstate Restoration LLC was already positioning personnel and equipment for large-scale post-storm recovery operations.
Stacy Mazur, CEO of Interstate Restoration, the second-largest commercial-building recovery firm in North America, started sending pre-positioned crews into affected regions as soon as winds subsided and floodwaters began to recede.
“The recovery will be long, but there are steps we can take to help clients resume normal operations sooner,” he said. “People need to be patient. There are no miracles, just hard work.”
Even after storms struck southeast Texas and cut across the Florida peninsula, Mazur likely couldn’t have fully anticipated the scale of what would follow. Hurricane Maria crossed the Atlantic and inflicted catastrophic damage on Puerto Rico and neighboring islands. Just as crews and subcontractors began gaining access to the ravaged Caribbean, wildfires flared in California, threatening thousands of homes and communities in Napa Valley.
Interstate responded to those needs as well.
Founded nearly 20 years ago, Interstate Restoration has handled major storm incidents before, but managing multiple catastrophic events that make back-to-back landfalls remains a significant logistical challenge.
“We were nearby when Harvey made landfall south of Houston,” Mazur said. The company operates from 20 offices in the U.S. and, through a sister company, another 35 offices in Canada.
Moving equipment from Corpus Christi to Houston proved difficult, he added, as many roads were flooded and bridges were impassable.
In the Houston area, Interstate focused on repair and remediation work for multi-family housing units rendered uninhabitable. “Thousands of units were flooded. We also responded to flooded car dealerships, hotels, fitness centers, several banks, country clubs, post offices — a real mixed bag of damage.”
In Houston alone, Mazur said Interstate’s trained crews handled 183 remediation and repair projects. Two months after Harvey, “we’ve mitigated many of them. A few of the larger losses will take another six to 12 months to repair.”
Project costs varied widely, he said, ranging from several thousand dollars up to $30–$40 million for the largest losses.
Many Houston businesses were restored quickly, while others may not return to normal until the following summer. “Our business is getting people back into business. Most of our clients are fully operational. We were able to complete many smaller projects in the first few weeks.”
Mazur noted that in Houston they did not encounter structures beyond repair. “We did not see that in Houston. We did during Katrina.”
To restore Houston, Interstate deployed roughly 150 company staff and hired about 3,000 subcontractors. Outsourcing much of the work made it easier to mobilize people and materials into the hardest-hit areas.
“Our subcontractor base is solid. We have strong relationships with many firms that were engaged as temporary help.”
Mazur expects about 95 percent of Houston-area repairs to be completed by next year, possibly by June or July. Approximately 1,000 workers will remain in Southeast Texas to continue repairs and oversight.
Some delays stem from property owners waiting for funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
Reflecting on the Houston response, Mazur said his crews worked closely with residents who had lost homes and almost all their belongings. “We felt the personal and emotional impact, like everyone else. It looked just like the scenes you saw on TV.”
Storm damage can also disrupt local economies. In late October, Atlanta-based First Data Services announced it would close its Telecheck Services division in Sugar Land, a Houston suburb, because of storm damage to its offices. Telecheck, which employed hundreds, leased 90,000 square feet in the Sugar Creek on the Lake building at 14141 Southwest Freeway. The building operator indicated the site would reopen by mid-November.
On other restoration fronts this season, Mazur provided the following updates:
Florida: “We established temporary offices in the Tampa area and in Boca Raton and managed 221 projects. Although Florida had more projects than Houston, the damage was generally less severe. The strongest impacts were in the Keys, Captiva and Marco islands, and in Naples, while larger commercial losses were concentrated in the Fort Lauderdale–North Miami corridor. We continue to work on larger resorts on Captiva and Marco islands; most work should be finished by Thanksgiving, with a few projects extending into the new year. We deployed about 150 workers and brought in 500 subcontractors. Interstate is also active on St. Thomas, which suffered heavily from Hurricane Irma.”
Puerto Rico: “We faced logistical and access challenges for a couple of weeks while working in Puerto Rico. Much of our work focused on hospitality properties near the airport.”
Napa fires: “We’re handling roughly 100 projects. Phone service is intermittent. Much of the work involves buildings contaminated by smoke and soot rather than direct fire destruction, so we’re using extensive air-scrubbing equipment and specialized cleaning techniques.”