By CASEY MELLADY, Peru Tribune Staff Writer
With the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina beginning to come to light, one thing is evident - people need more shelter. One local business is working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide just that.
Timberland RV Company, doing business as Adventure Manufacturing, located at 1482 N. Eel River Road, Peru, will be pumping out 25 to 30 travel trailers a week to provide housing units for the homeless in Louisiana, Alabama and Florida.
"Somebody has to provide shelter to these people," said Kean MacOwan, vice president and cofounder of Adventure Manufacturing. "They can't live in the astrodome forever."
Although it is unknown how long Adventure Manufacturing will provide the government the extra travel trailers, it doesn't seem as though it will cease any time soon.
"We'll be doing this until the beginning of 2006, minimum," MacOwan said. "Beyond that, I'm not sure."
One thing that is determined, however, is that Adventure Manufacturing has begun hiring up to 20 workers to compensate for the increase in production.
The Peru-based company has authorized FEMA a certain number of units per week that will go to its staging area.
"We send them to, for example, an air force runway so that they can make sure everything is okay with them," MacOwan said. "(FEMA) has techs that will get them ready for service, and they'll actually live in one of them while they do this."
One problem, however, for Adventure Manufacturing is keeping up with the government's demands as well as the its dealers' demands.
"We have written $2.5 million in the last 24 hours, so we're ramping this baby up," MacOwan said. "Unfortunately, not all of the units can go to the victims. The rest of production will have to be held for dealers for normal course of business."
According to MacOwan, FEMA has already bought travel trailers from virtually all recreational vehicle dealers.
"FEMA goes directly to RV dealers, and they go in and buy 28- to 32-foot travel trailers off these guys," MacOwan said. "And now they have zero inventory in those sizes."
For Adventure Manufacturing and other businesses like it, the spike in business is bittersweet.
"One side says 'it's great for the business,' but the other side says 'it's horrible that people have to go through this,'" MacOwan said. "I can't imagine going through what the thousands and thousands of people are going through - it's just a tragedy."
This is the second consecutive year that Adventure Manufacturing has upped its production to provide shelter for hurricane victims.
Copyright © 2005 Peru Tribune