There is much to celebrate about New Orleans — the architecture, food, the overall spirit that makes us special — but even with that, there is still much to be done.
For the past 20-plus years Avenue’s Activists of the Year have embodied a love for the city that also includes the need to do right by it and its citizens.
This year’s honorees include: Shannon McCloskey Able, Essence Banks, Mark Firmin, Bridgette Hamstead and Julie Schwam Harris.
Their interests are diverse: literacy, health care, neurodiversity and grassroots politics.
All are united in doing the best for New Orleans.
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Bridgette Hamstead
Bridgette Hamstead says she “embarked on the path of activism driven by personal experiences as someone with autism and ADHD, growing up in a society that often misunderstood and stigmatized these neurodivergent traits.” Hamstead is the founding director of Fish in a Tree (fishinatreenola.org,) an organization dedicated to supporting and championing neurodiversity in New Orleans
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Essence Banks
Essence Banks is entering her 20th year as a heart disease survivor and her 10th year as the head of Heart N Hands (heartnhands.org), an organization that educates girls ages 10-18 about heart health and heart disease prevention. In 2004, Banks found out at the age of 30 that she had coronary artery disease diagnosis
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Julie Schwam Harris
Children, women and families have an advocate in Julie Schwam Harris. She concentrated for years on addressing economic and environmental concerns, as well as racial injustice. She is spending “a lot of time keeping people informed on a wide range of issues and actions.” Economic security is a major focal point. “I have focused for
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Mark Firmin
Mark Firmin had been working as at Archbishop Rummel High School, where he had graduated from, when after 22 years, he took the position to be the executive director of Angels’ Place (angelsplacenola.org). Firmin had been a math teacher at Rummel and helped students do service projects, something that had been spurred after his first
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Shannon McCloskey Able
When COVID-19 hit, STAIR (Start the Adventure in Reading) Executive Director Shannon McCloskey Able and her staff took action to keep this program going. Able’s philosophy with her community work — and in this challenging situation – was, “I don’t see obstacles. I see opportunities. There is always another way of accomplishing something. We just
