Tony Frisella Sr. and the company he founded, St. Louis-based Frisella Landscape Group, are no strangers to philanthropy and giving back to their community.
But Frisella is quick to admit that the company’s recent efforts to help victims of Hurricanes Milton and Helene in North Carolina took those efforts to a whole different level. In October, Frisella and other family members traveled to areas impacted by those storms to assist with relief efforts, bringing a truckload of supplies collected at home with them.
“Honestly, I didn’t see the folks there getting the kind of help they needed,” Frisella says. “I think we were all motivated by the scope of the destruction and knew that we had the ability and resources to help. It’s fulfilling to use our skills in a way that makes a meaningful difference for those in need.”
The Frisella team collected everything from diapers and paper towels to bottled water and nonperishable food items, amassing enough in just a few days to fill the back of a Ford F350 and a 25-foot trailer. They coordinated their efforts with the Cajun Navy, a group formed in the wake of Hurricane Katrina that now works across the country to assist with rescue and relief efforts following natural disasters.
After dropping their donations at a central location that was operating on a nearly 24-hour basis — “We got there after midnight, and they were still going strong,” Frisella says. “Tractor trailer after tractor trailer coming in with donations. It was amazing,” — the Frisella team continued to the community of Castle Rock, N.C., which served as a home base throughout their week on the ground.
Their efforts focused on the hard-hit areas of Black Mountain, Chimney Rock and Lake Lure, where they pitched in to clear downed trees and helped transport supplies between distribution centers, including a major hub at Lake Lure.
The Frisella team also lent a hand to others like themselves who had come to the area to help, most notably a woman near Lake Lure who had begun with the modest goal of providing hot coffee for victims and volunteers alike.
“She was set up in a parking lot of a grocery store there, and the next thing she knew, she was getting donations dropped off. Stuff kept coming, and she was way over her head pretty quickly,” Frisella says. “We sort of set up shop there and started helping her organize things.
“It was a chore; where we were staying was about an hour-and-a-half drive there, so we ended up going back and forth, helping get things set up and organizing the whole operation there. It all goes to good use, of course, but it’s easy to get overwhelmed in that situation.”
While Frisella says he’d “go back in a heartbeat to help out,” he also admits that the experience was a sobering one for him and his team.
“People lost everything; that’s what really hit me the hardest,” he says. “They were happy for the help, but you could see that they were still in shock. All you could do was hug them, pray with them and give them what they needed to get by for the time being. There were a lot of good people there trying to help, but at the end of the day, sometimes a hug and a prayer were all you could do. You just hope it made a little bit of an impact.”
