Business View Caribbean | July 2019

48 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN JULY 2019 materials and as our office. Personally, our home which was under construction had a lot of damage, but we had insurance for that. The condo we were living in was also damaged – we were like everybody else on the island. Everything with western exposure got ripped apart. Only a few avoided it. The day after the storm was amazing. People were out in the street, clearing, picking up branches; it was a very positive feeling of people trying to rebuild. Of course, they were emotionally devastated but, somehow, they were able to just get to work.” Even though their crew was stretched thin on a variety of projects, JPK soon got involved in the FEMA Blue Tarp Program. After a natural disaster, FEMA comes in and the first step is putting blue tarps on roofs. The second step is temporary home repair, followed by permanent home repair. Knoepfel explains, “JPK did temporary home repairs to about 700 homes. We had several crews out there doing work for an excellent U.S. company called SLS. Hamilton Smith, project manager from SLS, did a fantastic job coordinating local contractors like JPK to do repairs for people on the island. That company should be commended for its efforts. They spent so much time working on these FEMA programs at their own expense of several million dollars without any funding. They paid their contractors and that’s why the program was a success.”