In a city full of gifted, hardworking, smart women, it says a lot that these women stand out from the crowd. Although they have very different missions, the common thread shared by these top achievers is doing the work, building consensus and believing in themselves along the way. Overnight success? That’s not a thing. It’s getting up every day and making it happen. Whether they are a force for environmental change, are passionate about social justice, provide education and career opportunities for young New Orleanians or lead the community as an entrepreneur with plenty of pluck, each of these women inspire.
Pamela Blackmon
Programs Manager
Preservation Hall Foundation
According to the organization, The Preservation Hall Foundation was established in 2011 with the mission to “protect, preserve and perpetuate the musical and cultural traditions of New Orleans.” For anyone that meets Pamela Blackmon for more than five minutes, they can tell that a connection between the Mississippi native and the musical Foundation was a match made by the universe – kismet.
Originally from Ocean Springs, Blackmon says she could “feel the energy coming across the Mississippi Sound” pulling her to the Crescent City. When the 2010 oil spill ended Blackmon’s big box retail career, she took the opportunity to move to New Orleans and create Funk Baby.
Funk Baby’s mission was to help the amazing musicians around the community succeed. Funk Baby filled a need to help artists in various capacities from financial help to full production, anything they needed support with while already wearing many hats as a performer.
At a crossroads with Funk Baby, Blackmon started with Preservation Hall as a consultant for the business’s merchandise and shop. Now, six years later, Blackmon serves as the Preservation Hall Foundation’s programs manager.
Since COVID-19, the role really has consisted of rebuilding what existed before the pandemic, engaging with the world in a new way through music education, community engagement, musician support and more.
“The venue itself has a million shows, but the Foundation allows the creative side, the impactful side, to be pushed out into the community the way the musicians want it to,” said Blackmon. “It’s their legacy, it’s their story. Bringing that back to life has involved, you know, pushing up my sleeves, but being focused on what the musicians want.”
One aspect is making sure our elder musicians are taken care of. Blackmon noted a shift in care for the elder artists during COVID. A focus is not only making sure the older musicians make it back into Preservation Hall, but using their knowledge and stories to help teach the new and younger generations.
Though many out of town classes and kids come to the venue, the need to reach kids where they are and bring the music and learning to them has been a crucial part of Blackmon’s focus and the growth of the foundation. Blackmon and the foundation recently went into a school for the first time in four years. bringing musicians to Hynes Charter School in Lakeview. This program not only allows kids to have a new understanding and appreciation for music, but it also gives the elder musicians who live and breathe this life a chance to talk about and share it.
In another aspect of community engagement, Blackmon also co-founded a Carnival marching krewe with DJ Soul Sister, the Krewe of King James Super Bad Sex Machine Strollers, as well as involvement in the inception of the Krewe Boheme parade.
“I don’t know how I am here in this moment, but something in the sphere of New Orleans is saying ‘Let us use you.’ And that’s what I wanted. When I moved here I wanted to make sure that I was able to make an impact in the areas that need it the most.”
Heather Hodges
Director of Institutional Advancement
The Historic New Orleans Collection
Following a nationwide search, in December 2021, Columbus, Ohio-native Heather Hodges was chosen to fill a new position at The Historic New Orleans Collection (THNOC). As director of institutional advancement, Hodges aids the organization in raising awareness of its many facets, as well as growing engagement and financial support.
“The biggest challenge we face in raising awareness is the complexity of this institution,” said Hodges. “Unlike many other museums, we’re also a research center, a publishing house, and we have a wide array of public programs. It can be a challenge getting all of that across. And then there’s also the fact that we don’t charge for admission. Many people don’t know that.”
Over the past two years, Hodges has significantly beefed up THNOC’s media presence through print advertising, billboards, airport signage and TV ads, as well as worked to form partnerships with organizations like New Orleans & Company.
Following THNOC’s mission to preserve and promote New Orleans culture, Hodges has also been working with Disney as the global powerhouse conducted research for its upcoming new ride, Tiana’s Bayou Adventures. Set to open this summer at Walt Disney World and Disneyland, the ride is based on Disney’s 2009 animated film, “The Princess and The Frog,” set in New Orleans in the 1920s.
“The Disney people made multiple visits here and we entered into a sustained conversation driven by their desire to give their park visitors an authentic sense of the city,” she said. “When they asked me to write their first-ever guest post on their blog about our work together that was really special.”
Since coming to New Orleans to attend Tulane University Law School more than 20 years ago, Hodges said she has fallen for the city and is honored to give back to it in this role.
“I believe THNOC, and all our museums and cultural institutions, play an indispensable role in coming together to celebrate our cultural heritage,” she said. “I have traveled all over the world and NOLA was always the place I came back to. I feel so fortunate to be in the city I love with colleagues who share a love of building community through culture.”
Kimberly Davis Reyher
Executive Director
Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana
Every year, the Young Leadership Council announces a cohort of role models, a group of leaders assembled to help cultivate the next generation of New Orleans leadership. For 2024, Kimberly Davis Reyher is one of 10 leaders on that list.
Surely it takes leadership to manage the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana (CRCL) team of 22 and work closely with a large board and advisory committee. Her job involves advocacy, government relations, experiential education and communications. She was also surprised to find conference planning on her docket, in her planning role for the biennial State of the Coast, the largest gathering in the state to discuss bold, science-based action to sustain the coast of Louisiana, its coastal communities, environment and economy.
Beyond all the nuts and bolts of her big job, Davis Reyher is a brilliant consensus builder. Under her leadership, the organization has partnered with a diverse set of interests ranging from business and industry and national nonprofits to community fishing organizations and indigenous tribes.
CRCL has recruited thousands of volunteers to plant hundreds of thousands of trees and marsh grasses and construct 8,000 feet of living shore oyster reefs with community partners. In partnership with New Orleans restaurants, more than 13 million pounds of oyster shells are recycled and used as artificial reefs. It’s part of a broader effort to return shells to the sea through “living shorelines” that help slow rising sea levels and erosion.
Getting everybody a seat at the table, and assuring that diverse voices are heard, may just be her superpower. “We want to build relationships based on trust. You must listen and understand what’s important to your partners and honor that.”
She understands how overwhelming big issues like coastal and climate crisis can be. “The issues we face are really complicated and simple at the same time,” she said. “We live on land that is sinking. That’s a natural process in a river delta. Our focus is taking actions that can help us safely live, work and play.”
The state’s controversial $50 billion, 50-year plan for coastal restaurants includes restoration projects that would add or maintain 802 square miles of coastal land and wetland. “We are so lucky to have this big muddy river to work,” she said. “It built all this coastline in the first place. It’s both a challenge and a tool. The project that we are most focused on is reconnecting the river to its wetlands. Areas that used to be fresh water are now saltier, so that restoration will cause changes to where we harvest the most shrimp and oysters. Our coastline is worth saving. It is changing regardless. Status quo is not an option.”
Lauren Darnell
Executive Director | Principal Consultant
MiNO | Porch and Okra Consulting
As a loud and proud voice for diversity, equity and inclusion in hospitality spaces, Lauren Darnell is taking the next step in her personal journey to make New Orleans a better place to work across all industries.
With the formation of her consulting business, Porch and Okra Consulting, she can now apply the many lessons she’s learned through keen observation and assessment of an organization’s culture into varying industries. As executive director of the Made in New Orleans Foundation (MiNO) since it was formalized in 2018, her focus has been on scholarships, mentoring and business coaching for Black, indigenous and people of color in the restaurant and hospitality business.
“At the industry level, we amplify the voices of professionals of color and provide support to hospitality companies that are seeking to eliminate bias in their organizations,” she explained. Inclusive mentorship and educational opportunities are directed to lead spaces that have historically been exclusive. Of the nine New Orleans chefs and hospitality professionals recognized as semifinalists for this year’s James Beard Awards, Darnell worked with four of them.
Not surprisingly, her expertise is in demand by all kinds of policy makers, from Tales of the Cocktail to the James Beard Awards, where she served as a leadership judge, taking stock of each applicant’s social impact and approach to issues like food access and sustainability.
“The clients I’m working with now are all doing amazing work but want to take a deeper dive around operationalizing equity and inclusivity,” said Darnell, who earned degrees in anthropology and women’s studies from UNO. Through interviews and participant observation, she assesses culture to see what’s working and what isn’t.
For example, one recent client found that inclusive policies weren’t trickling down from management as they should to the rest of organization. “There was a formal and an informal culture that wasn’t aligning,” she said. As a third-party coach, she was brought in to observe and enable better communication between all parties. “It’s not like things were going terribly wrong. They were going OK. But a certain pattern emerged that might be affecting growth or creating high turnover. I’m there to coach and support them over that hurdle.”
For Darnell, the thrill is to share what she’s learned with so many others. She’s casting a wider net for clients involved in policy making both in Louisiana and in DC. She sees her journey at MiNO as an organic evolution, now shifting to allow someone else to come in to manage programming while she pursues broader interests and ways to impact.
“I’m looking to spend more time writing, doing research and assessments,” she said. “Creating change is yet another way to invest in the next generation. We want people to stay in New Orleans out of college, not leave.” Staying hopeful and positive, keeping others engaged civically and in community matters greatly to Darnell. “Small acts of kindness are a form of resistance. We can’t recognize someone else’s humanity unless we see our own.”
Alice Franz Glenn
Executive Vice President | Board President Elect
New Orleans & Company | Association of Junior Leagues International
Houma native Alice Franz Glenn is a woman passionate about making positive change in the region she dearly loves. It’s a passion that’s led her to a diverse resume that has taken her from work in government campaigns, to fundraising for nonprofits, to founding her own strategic planning firm, to the position she proudly now holds, that of executive vice president at New Orleans & Company, the official destination sales and marketing organization for New Orleans’ tourism industry.
“I am so lucky to have my values and personal interests aligned with my professional career,” she said. “The hospitality and tourism industries are such a vital part of our economy here that I knew it would be where I could come and make a real impact.”
The road to her job at New Orleans & Company included work for a longtime friend, Walt Leger, as his legislative assistant during his final term in office as a state representative. While continuing her consulting proactive, Glenn worked with Leger as he prepared for his next role as CEO of New Orleans & Company. She was then offered the chance to join him as executive vice president.
“My job now is mostly strategy — it’s a lot of work in government affairs and policy-related work as well as some internal operations,” she said, adding that New Orleans & Company is just getting started on strategic and vision planning work for the tourism industry and community at large.
“The key focuses of our work have been many of the same as are facing the broader community,” she said. “Things like safety, infrastructure, connectivity and affordable housing.”
Outside of her day job, Glenn’s volunteer work has focused primarily on women’s health and advancing the well-being of women. A past president of the Junior League of New Orleans (which celebrates 100 years in May), this month Glenn will officially start her reign as the board president of the Association of Junior Leagues International at the organization’s annual conference, which takes place in New Orleans from May 15-18. The association boasts over 100,000 members in 300 different Junior Leagues spread across the United States and Canada.
Glenn said she’s proud of the years she’s spent with the Junior League, specifically its work to eliminate the pink tax in 2019 — a bill that went into effect in 2022 that halted the taxation of diapers and feminine products.
“It took us three attempts to get that passed,” she said. “And now we’re hoping that the third time will again be a charm with another bill aimed at providing period products to schools around the state.”
While she’s worked in an array of fields and positions, Glenn said her main role has remained the same.
“Strategy — this is what I do,” she said. “I love to connect the dots, whether it’s individuals to each other of people to resources or community. I really feel like this is my strength.”
Jas Rogers
Event Production Manager
Contemporary Arts Center
New Orleans is one of those cities that, if it wants you here and you’re meant to be here, everything will work out. And that’s exactly how the New Orleans chapter of Jas Rogers’ life has unfolded.
The Houston native moved to the city officially in 2017 to continue helping a friend who had opened a pop-up. With a background in food and a degree in culinary management from the Art Institute of Houston, heading to a city with such a rich food background just made sense.
Before getting into events, Rogers opened Coalesce Goods, a restaurant concept in St. Roch Market.
“I wanted to find my grounding in what I wanted to do here in New Orleans, and Coalesce Goods was my gateway into finding that portal,” said Rogers. “I knew I wanted to help people, I wanted to figure out a way to connect to people and make them feel good about themselves.”
Like many restaurants and hospitality ventures, Rogers and Coalesce Goods were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and Hurricane Ida. Following Ida, and the closure of Coalesce Goods, is when Rogers pivoted and began coordinating events for the Orpheum Theater. Wanting to lean more into community and nonprofit, Rogers reached out to the Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) and has been a part of the organization – and what Rogers refers to as keeping the culture alive – for over two years.
The CAC has been a staple in the city for decades, giving a voice to local artists looking to display their work across various mediums from painting to performance art. In addition to the center’s rotating exhibits, a real focus is put on events for the community.
Rogers’ role is making sure a CAC event is a success from start to finish and building relationships as a team from her clients to the staff that clean up afterward.
In addition to her previous work and her current position with the CAC, Rogers founded SaucexDat. Started during her time in culinary school, while she was selling plates of food outside of her dorm room, SaucexDat is a rebrand of her former restaurant concept that breathed new life out of Hurricane Ida with both new and old recipes that stays true to her mission and purpose in life. At the end of 2022, Rogers even won her Very Local “Blind Kitchen” episode.
And now, with her work with Turning Tables – an organization that advocates for equity in the hospitality industry in support for the Black and Brown communities around New Orleans – and bringing organizations like that into the CAC, Rogers is doing the work to bridge a gap in the art community and create space and events geared towards the Black community.
Lora Ann Chaisson
Principal Chief
United Houma Nation
The largest indigenous tribe in the state of Louisiana, the United Houma Nation has a documented history that dates back to 1682. And yet, the tribe has never been granted federal recognition, a designation that would allow the 19,000 members access to certain federal benefits, protections and services.
It’s a fact that has boggled the mind of Lora Ann Chaisson her entire life, and one she has been intent on changing since being elected principal chief of the United Houma Nation in 2022.
Our stories are the stories of this region,” said Chaisson. “The Houma founded the French Market as the trading post for the tribes in the Southeast. My grandfather was a vendor who sold vegetables, shrimp and oysters…What became known as Congo Square used to be our sacred grounds where we held traditional green corn ceremonies. The name for Baton Rouge came about because when the French explorers came, they saw a red stick that signified the boundary between our tribe and the Bayougoula.”
In addition to serving on the Houma tribal council for 14 years, Chaisson is the alternate Southeast representative of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) and was instrumental in bringing the organization’s milestone 80th Annual Convention and Marketplace to New Orleans in November 2023. During the convention, which drew more than 2,000 leaders from tribes across the nation, Chaisson spoke out about the Houmas’ need for federal recognition. Not long after, she became the first United Houma Nation Chief to attend the annual Tribal Nations Summit at the White House.
Chaisson has also served 11 years on the board of the American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association, and this past February was appointed to her second term on the Native American Employment and Training Council by the secretary of labor.
The work to represent and fight for her people never ends for Chaisson, who proudly served at the Houmas’ food booth at this year’s New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival — a presence the tribe has maintained since the first festival — and is busy prepping for the United Houma Nation’s Powwow, set for June 15 and 16 at the Houma Civic Center.
“My parents instilled in me that everyone is created equal and created for a purpose in life,” she said. “That is the thinking I bring to the tribe every day. My voice is not my voice any longer. As chief, I am bringing the voices of 19,000 people to the table. We are fighting for the people who fought for us and for the young ones not even born yet.”
Kheri Billy
Chief Executive Officer
Café Reconcile New Orleans
Always, as her career has evolved, Kheri Billy sought the answer to one question.
“What does it mean in this job to be of service to my community?”
The Algiers native graduated from UNO with an accounting degree, armed with the skills to embrace granular details in collaboration with others. She was drawn to the nonprofit world, to make a difference by giving structure and support to the critical work of fundraising and development. Beyond crunching numbers and setting budgets, Billy can see the human application of what her job can render.
Her career trajectory has prepared Billy perfectly for her role of CEO at Café Reconcile. As of February, that role involves managing the nonprofit’s largest gift, a $4 million donation from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott.
Billy’s mission mind set began at Second Harvest. “I saw how their vision was critical for me to do a good job,” she recalled. Food insecurity stayed in the picture with a move to Daughters of Charity. “I was able to see how the poor nutrition affects people’s mental health and physical well-being.” She helped propel projects that included adding a pharmacy in Carrollton and a new location in New Orleans East. “I love the ability to direct money and resources to help get an important job done.”
The mother of two decided to adapt to her kids’ schedule as CFO at her older son’s high school, De La Salle. “Working in education challenged everything I thought I knew,” she said. “Seeing knowledge and education in process every day was a final piece for me, to understand the resources it took to be sure all the students stayed in school.”
Billy took the CFO job at Café Reconcile in 2018 when the organization was struggling both financially and operationally. “We were fiscally in bad shape. The program needed to be revamped and revitalized.” While the restaurant and catering divisions, under the stewardship of Chef Martha Wiggins since 2021, are vital to the mission, it’s the programming and training that is Café Reconcile’s beating heart.
Fusing operations and administration with hospitality creates a unique space, said Billy, who became CEO in April 2023. “We are one organization with one mission.”
Forced to slow things down during the pandemic, Billy and her team of women leaders implemented a strategic three-year plan to deepen student engagement and programming.
Café Reconcile works with 120 young adults every year, ages 16-24, providing workforce development and training, and equipping them with tools to achieve their potential, as they learn both job and life skills. “Some come to us strong, just in need of structure. Just because a child turns 18, that doesn’t mean they don’t need support.
While there are many success stories, not every student succeeds. “That’s hard. We get close to our young people. We want them to succeed. When they backtrack, it’s hard. It’s not easy living in New Orleans, where poverty is loud and you must manage broken systems. We constantly recalibrate. I’m a big dreamer. I believe in the success of our mission with all my heart.”
Taslya Mejia
International Relations Manager
New Orleans Jazz Museum
In the city where jazz was born, the New Orleans Jazz Museum plays an integral part in keeping the history and culture of the city, its music and its origins alive and well both locally and beyond.
Celebrating the music and its roots, the museum not only hosts a performance space, but also houses interactive exhibits and research facilities, while offering multigenerational educational programming for children, universities and adults all with the mission of promoting jazz as integral to world history.
Taslya Mejia is the international relations manager for the museum and continues the promotional mission through her work and ongoing outreach efforts. The Honduras-born, New York-raised New Orleans transplant has been in the city since 2002 dedicating her time to the community. She began volunteer work with the local Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, eventually being hired as an executive assistant there before turning her sites to the local branch of Telemundo. Telemundo serendipitously brought Mejia and the current director of the museum Greg Lambousy together during an interview. Lambousy would later call Mejia after the start of the pandemic to ask her to join the team at the museum.
Four years later, Mejia has developed educational programs and exchanges that have pushed international boarders from Costa Rica to Serbia – including providing musicians for French President Emmanuel Macron, as well as sending musicians to France to perform at the Presidential Palace. Being at the museum also gives Mejia the opportunity to celebrate her culture. She notes that during Hispanic Heritage Month there are weekly performances supporting the Latino community and featuring Latino bands.
Mejia’s main mission in her work and beyond is creating opportunities in her community and following in the footsteps of the work she saw her mother do for years.
“Everyone talks about diversity, inclusion, equity and all, but you can say a lot,” said Mejia. “It takes someone to go out and do the work to really create those opportunities for others.”
She notes New Orleans being a community where your dreams can come true and give you the chance to be who you want to be, so creating opportunities for others and mentoring women is her way of giving back to a city that gave her so much.
