A Business and Home Hardening For-Profit Cooperative brings a unique and powerful set of benefits to every stakeholder in the wildfire-resilience system. Unlike temporary contracting programs or short-term grant-funded crews, a cooperative creates a durable, community-rooted industry capable of supporting decades of wildfire prevention, home hardening, and resilience-building. For a challenge as long-term and wide-reaching as Western wildfire risk, a cooperative is not simply an option—it is the most stable and equitable organizational form available.
At its core, the cooperative provides five essential system functions:
It sources work, securing projects through partnerships with cities, counties, Fire Safe Councils, utilities, insurers, and community networks such as churches, homeowner associations, and neighborhood councils.
It aggregates materials, purchasing vents, Class A roofing, tempered windows, and other Business and Home Hardening components in bulk to drive down costs and strengthen local supply chains.
It provides employment, offering its worker-members scheduled assignments, high quality supervision, and predictable wages supported by internal quality assurance.
It distributes profits, giving each member an ownership share and an annual dividend that grows over time—an economic model that anchors local wealth rather than exporting or exploiting it.
And it provides training and advancement, offering continuing education, project management pathways, contracting-license access, and leadership opportunities that
empower workers to grow within the organization.
This model is especially transformative for young workers who too often cycle between seasonal or temporary jobs without benefits, stability, or ownership. The cooperative replaces that uncertainty with a clear pathway to long-term economic mobility, transparent decision-making, and a meaningful role in building wildfire-safe communities. Instead of “go work for a contractor,” the narrative becomes: “help build a business with your community.”
The cooperative is designed to operate in collaboration with trade unions, not in competition. Unions remain essential for large-scale construction, roofing, electrical, and general contracting work. The cooperative focuses on small- to mid-size Business and Home Hardening jobs, home assessments, defensible-space projects, and community assignments—often the labor segment that falls between major construction firms and volunteer-based efforts. Through partnership agreements, union apprentices can earn hours through the cooperative, and the co-op can source pre-apprentices for unions, expanding the regional workforce without undermining jurisdiction, wages, or scope of work. This creates a unified labor ecosystem where unions, co-ops, and contractors each strengthen the wildfire-prevention economy rather than compete for diminishing ground.
For insurers and utilities, the cooperative provides a consistent, standardized workforce capable of delivering verified mitigation work that reduces losses, lowers liability, and builds community trust. For state governments and philanthropy, it becomes the anchor institution that stabilizes the workforce, ensures equitable access to resilience jobs, and supports community-based economic development. And for community colleges and technical schools, the cooperative provides a direct employment pipeline for graduates of newly created Business and Home Hardening certificate programs. It— ensuring that training leads to real jobs and that communities retain the skilled workers they cultivate.
Ultimately, the Business and Home Hardening For-Profit Cooperative is more than a workforce model—it is the long-term engine of a safer, stronger, and more resilient Western region. It allows communities to build and own the solutions to their own wildfire risk, generating lasting economic opportunity while protecting homes, businesses, and shared landscapes for generations to come.