BullBag Corporation Responding to Hurricane Harvey

Thursday, September 14, 2017

KILLINGWORTH >> Heavy rains from Hurricane Harvey were still falling on parts of Texas when the BullBag Corporation put their support efforts in motion.

“We’re on our way,” said Paul DiSpazio, BullBag’s CEO and founder. “We’re mobilizing housing right now, we’re mobilizing trucks, we have tractor trailer loads full of bags.”

The bags are the company’s eponymous BullBags, advertised as reusable dumpster bags that hold up to 4,500 pounds. Vehicles, support equipment, supplies and personnel were being sent from locations in all eight states BullBag has offices in, including from its corporate headquarters in Killingworth.

DiSpazio said they will work with the Federal Emergence Management Agency, Army Corps of Engineers, and the Red Cross. His company began coordinating with those organizations before the storm hit the Gulf Coast.

The company had prior experience in disaster recovery efforts.

“We responded previously to Hurricane Sandy,” DiSpazio said. “We were involved with Hurricane Matthew on a smaller note. It’s part of our business; it’s what we do.”

And while their support comes from a company policy, he said it’s also personal.

“I was directly involved in Hurricane Katrina and seeing the devastation, and seeing the loss of lives,” DiSpazio said, “as well as peoples’ entire lives of their homes and businesses going down the drain.”

DiSpazio was speaking from a company office in Orlando, on his way to assist in Texas. He was in South Florida when the tropical system struck the Texas coast, and left soon after.

One form of long-term support for the region will be employment. DiSpazio said they had planned opening a Texas office in 12 to 18 months, but the storm drove their schedule forward. Area residents out of work because of the storm, he said, will be hired on as drivers and in other support positions.

“We’re there for the entirety,” DiSpazio said. “This is going to be rebuilding and that’s going to take five or 10 years to complete, it is a long term commitment.”