Derrick Standley of Lebanon praised Missouri's quick response to the May 22 Joplin tornado.
But Loni Cotton of St. Charles County said officials must do a better job of quick information gathering to speed up their disaster responses.
Standley is Waste Corporation of America's Midwest regional director for engineering and compliance.
On Tuesday, he told the state Senate's Emergency Response Subcommittee, for the Interim Committee on Natural Disaster Recovery, that his company "mobilized quickly" after the powerful twister struck Joplin and "several of the WCA personnel were directly affected by the storm ... so it became a very personal things for us."