C’mon Fall

Editor’s Note

Summer is my least favorite time of the year.

For me, summer is the time when all my bills go up, I spend a fortune on summer camps just so that I don’t have to constantly nag my eldest to get out of her pajamas and off a screen, friends disappear left and right on trips making it a challenge to get together, and the one big way I handle stress — walking or running outside — thanks to the heat changes from being a joy to a sweat-drenched chore. This is also my first full summer as a New Orleans homeowner, so I can now add living in a new level of fear of hurricanes to my list.

This summer feels particularly challenging. In addition to gas prices, summer always brings an increase in crime, but as of still early in the summer, we’re already reaching pre-Katrina levels. Yesterday it was a one-year-old shot in the middle of the afternoon at COSTCO.

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So, I look for bright spots, and one of those also came via the news with the announcement of the formation of the Nola Coalition, a group of civic organizations and over 100 businesses committed to addressing crime, in part by investing $15 million over three years into improving opportunity for at-risk youth. As the Mandelorian would say (I live with a Star Wars obsessed man), “This is the way.” Crime is a direct result of disparity — in education, in opportunity, in wealth, in hope. If we make investments now aimed at fixing disparity, we will solve our crime problem, pure and simple.

Our cover person this month is a man who has devoted his life to addressing disparity, not just in New Orleans, but everywhere. His work is changing lives, and changing our community, and he’s getting ready to scale up in a big way. I encourage anyone who can to be a part of it.

Speaking of someone I admire (and this summer being a particularly challenging one), our editorial band of misfits here at Renaissance Publishing was recently devastated with the loss of one of our own. Suzanne Pfefferle Tafur, a talented journalist and ninth generation New Orleanian who contributed so much to many of our publications for years, died of cancer on July 9 at the age of 37. She left behind two precious little boys, a doting husband, and the broken hearts of everyone fortunate enough to have met her. I will forever be in awe of how much strength, courage and sunshine could fit inside the most petite of packages.

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Suzanne fought so hard for what she loved. May we all have the courage to do the same.

Kimberley Singletary
Managing Editor
Kimberley@BizNewOrleans.com

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