Glenn Godsey spent three years in the Military Police in the 1980\u2032s, a stretch of his life that instilled the notion of helping those in need.
That notion is the driving force for the Linden resident who is starting Critical Clean, a deep cleaning service offering free decontamination services to fire departments across the state as those first responders contend with the coronavirus pandemic.
It’s a way, as Godsey said, to say thanks and make sure those first responders are safe and healthy.
“I’m former military from way back in the day and I have that gene in me,” Godsey said. “I relate to that character and quality in people and I certainly appreciate what all of our first responders are doing at the hospitals and the fire and police departments.
“They call it ‘espirt de corps.’ It’s a spirit of kinship and teamsmanship and camaraderie. It’s a weird thing. I’m 56 and talking about a time when I was 18. But it was the impactful three years of my life. It instilled in me at a very young age a sense of pride and duty and responsibility and community. That’s where that internal feelings for me come from.”
The company, which Godsey said could expand to police stations, prisons and nursing homes, will utilize fogging machines and electrostatic sprayers with eco friendly products to disinfect those buildings.
“These guys are out and in all sorts of scenarios where they’re around this stuff. A lot of the non-volunteer fire departments, those guys stay for several days and sleep in dormitory types,” Godsey said. “We wanted to start out by making a blanket offer to all fire departments in New Jersey. If they would like us to give their facilities a thorough cleaning, we’ll do it as a gesture of good will that we want to help our communities and get our state back in business.”
It’s a new venture for Godsey and the other investors, who have a variety of backgrounds in real estate, financing and banking. But that hasn’t deterred the group from putting in the necessary work and requirements as a first step to helping those fire departments.
“We’re in the process of getting all of the certifications and approvals. The equipment isn’t new to us, we have experience with this in different applications,” Godsey said. “We are learning as we go to a certain extent but that’s how all startups are.”
The business can be reached via phone at 1-866-305-1867, by email at [email protected] or at its website (which is currently under construction) at https://www.covidcleaning.com/.
Godsey hopes that the company will be able to start taking appointments from fire departments across the state and be ready to sanitize buildings in two weeks.
“We saw a need for disinfecting buildings. People will pay attention to that and have some sort of comfort in walking into a building or business that has been professionally cleaned,” Godsey said. “We want to start out by offering some assistance to people.”
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