Is the use of the verb “repaired” significant?

Meremoth was the fourth builder (or team leader) mentioned in Nehemiah’s list but the first of whom it is recorded that he repaired; the previous crews built (see Nehemiah 3:2). The Hebrew word translated as repaired means literally to strengthen, to make strong. The assumption embodied in the word is that something already exists, but its state of weakness requires strengthening. Perhaps the Babylonians had not completely torn apart the section of wall assigned to Meremoth so that strengthening or repair or reinforcement was sufficient to make it serve its purpose again. (That would make sense because the stones dropped off the top of the wall would accumulate near the bottom of the wall; in other sections of the wall the ground sloped away so that stones would roll downhill and make dislodging lower stones easier.) Alternatively, this is part of the wall that the Jews had begun to rebuild some years ago but of which Artaxerxes had signed a cease-and-desist order (Ezra 4:12, Ezra 4:24). Note that the word repaired is used to describe the work done by the next fourteen crews before we again meet the word built in Nehemiah 3:13 at the Gate Nehemiah had used to exit the city for his investigative night excursion (Nehemiah 2:13).