Home Repair Network Launches Contractor Capacity-Building Program to Address Urgent Home Repair Needs

Contractors take part in a workshop during the Home Repair Network’s capacity-building program.

There aren’t enough contractors to handle the need for home repairs in St. Louis. That’s the refrain that Jessica Gaines, who serves as outreach coordinator for the Home Repair Network, hears often.

“My take on that is that it’s not true. I think there are plenty of contractors,” Gaines said. “I think we need to add that word qualified in — and to the standards that are required from our funders and the city and the state, which are all perfectly reasonable — but there are enough contractors. They just need to be equipped with the right resources so that they can hold the qualifications and requirements necessary to do the work.”

Now, with the launch of a contractor capacity-building program, the Home Repair Network is broadening the ecosystem of contractors who can operate in the realm of nonprofit construction and complete much-needed repair work in their own communities. Eight contractors spanning a variety of trades, from painting to plumbing, are currently enrolled in the pilot program. Each contractor will receive funding, one-on-one coaching, and other resources while attending classes on how to run a successful business over the course of a year.

“There’s a whole network that a business owner has to be aware of in order to be successful,” Gaines said. “You have to develop the person to develop the business.”

In addition to JSMF’s investment in the pilot program, the Home Repair Network has engaged several partners to support the contractor cohort throughout the process and beyond. Rise Community Development is providing forgivable loans that go toward next year’s insurance premiums, while Associated Bank donated laptops preloaded with accounting software to each contractor.

Other partners — including Liv Group LLC, Rising Together Foundation, the Small Business Empowerment Center, and the St. Louis Development Corporation — are offering everything from Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) certification training to workshops on succession planning and making successful bids.

Kevin Poe, who is closing out his tenure as executive director of the Home Repair Network, credits Gaines with the program’s successful launch.

“Working with incredible community partners and a dedicated group of eight contractors, Jessica has developed a scalable curriculum designed not only to qualify contractors for grant-funded home repair through the required documentation, but more importantly — to upskill and best position them for success in the back office skills and best business and banking practices that are the backbone behind the physical repair work,” Poe said.

Building up St. Louis’s home repair contractor ecosystem is especially important after the May 2025 tornado, which damaged thousands of buildings, adding to the backlog of home repair needs in North City.

“We need them now more than ever to help recover the neighborhoods that they live in and others,” Gaines said. “I think the tornado shed light on this being a hole that needed to be filled.”

Already, one contractor in the program stressed that he’s learned the importance of working on his business rather than only in his business. And by enhancing their businesses, the hope is that these contractors will become part of the home repair solution in their own neighborhoods.

“We’re solving to broaden the network of contractors that can come into the nonprofit world and do the work that’s needed for the community,” Gaines said. “And the other thing is not outsourcing that work to contractors that aren’t in the communities that we’re working in, but … reinvesting those dollars back into the community by way of the people who live and work there on a regular basis.”