Go Anywhere

COVER UPDATE

Go Anywhere

Lynn Murtagh's airplane lets him travel from one job to another anywhere east of the Mississippi River. It's given him a broad range as the economic downturn takes hold.

Lynn Murtagh has been through this before.The chief executive of Fort Myers-based Meridian Construction & Development saw the oil bust wipe out his first construction company in Louisiana during the 1980s.As bad as it is in Florida now in the construction industry, "I've seen it worse in Louisiana," Murtagh says. "There's still work, it just seems now there are contractors willing to take it at lower costs."After the oil bust, Murtagh started construction projects for telecommunications companies in Florida. It was a great business to be in until the tech and telecom bust in the early 2000s. That's when he started chasing government-related projects, an area that could carry him through this rough patch.Still, business at his firm is down 50% this year and he's had to lay off the bulk of his small staff. At the beginning of the year, Meridian had eight employees and now there are two. "A lot of the things I had lined up got canceled or put on hold," he says.But Murtagh is not one to get bogged down by depressing news from the contractors, building owners, Realtors and vendors he works with. "All I hear is doom and gloom, so I try to tune it out," he says. "I don't remember the last time I heard good news, so I quit asking."Still, there are government-related projects that haven't been scrapped. Half of the work Meridian does is for owners of commercial buildings who lease them to government agencies such as the U.S. Social Security Administration and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency."I've got projects that I'm chasing now for immigration, social security and other agencies," Murtagh says. "There's one in this area, but most of them are out of the area."That's where Murtagh's four-seat Mooney airplane comes in handy. "I do consulting for building owners anywhere within a day's flight," he says. That includes every state east of the Mississippi River, plus Texas.Without his airplane, Murtagh would not be able to have the range of territory he has because it would take a full day just to reach some of the areas by commercial flights where he's landed jobs. And it means he's more nimble and competitive than much larger rivals.With Democrats promising huge construction projects to revive the slowing economy, Murtagh might be a beneficiary of that government largesse. But Murtagh isn't going to count on it. "I haven't heard anything yet about government spending," he says. "It's business as usual."-Jean Gruss