Gambit’s forty Under 40, class of 2016

Sarah Ambrose, 34

Co-founder and music educator, NOLArts Learning Center

Book presently reading: NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity&#Ten;by Steve Silberman

Drink of choice: &#Ten;Wine, &#Ten;preferably crimson

Hidden talent: Turning her feet backward almost one hundred eighty degrees

At NOLArts Learning center, co-founder Sarah Ambrose helps autistic children and those with different abilities love music for its own sake.

  When fresh families come to visit NOLArts, Ambrose is very clear: She’s not a music therapist. Rather, she’s an educator, whose music-centric pedagogy helps kids unwind from regimented afternoons of therapy and appointments.

  ”(Our music class is) that hour during the week where those kids are just smiling and having a good time,” she says.

  In addition to cutting liberate in the classroom, Ambrose’s music students learn to participate in the community. Thanks to projects she helped spearhead, students get uproarious with Preservation Hall musicians and march in the Intergalactic Krewe of Chewbacchus parade.

  Projects like hers fight hurting stereotypes about what people with autism (or other challenges) can do – one drumbeat at a time.

  ”We have this beautiful culture here . and with some adjustments, or maybe with no adjustments, depending on the individual, they can be a part of it,” she says. “It’s kind of electrifying.” – KAT STROMQUIST

Tarriona “Tank” Ball, 28

Singer, songwriter, spoken word artist

Dearest fresh album: Malibu by .Anderson Paak & the Free Nationals

Drink of choice: Rum punch

Hidden talent: “I can walk like a chicken pretty well. . And I’m learning ukulele.”

Calling from the road in Fresh Jersey while the band is on tour with Big &#Ten;Freedia, Tarriona “Tank” Ball – vocalist &#Ten;and songwriter with the genre-spanning &#Ten;R&B clothing Tank & the Bangas – has spent &#Ten;several weeks on tour channeling the energy from the bounce artist into the band’s dynamic live spectacle.

  ”It’s one of the most exhilarating practices,” she says. “Everywhere we go there’s someone who wants to hear ‘Rollercoasters’ or ‘Boxes and Squares’ . It makes me excited to make more music the fans are going to love.”

  The Fresh Orleans native grew up singing in church, and she went on to be part of an award-winning Plunge Fresh Orleans poetry team – two coerces informing her unique voice propelling the band to international acclaim.

  ”It’s titillating to know you can literally go to so many places away from home where people know your music,” she says. “You always expect no one’s going to be there . but it surprises me when they’re there – and they have a request.”

  Ball also leads workshops in schools to help empower developing voices.

  ”I just feel like nobody came to my school to do that for me,” she says. “I took pride in being a wallflower – key word ‘flower.’ I was waiting for someone to bring that out of me. . When I talk to these damsels, they have so much going on, they’re so special, they just need one person to do that. . Kids aren’t afraid to not be cool, but older ones, there’s a little bit more work to break down the cool wall and know the ‘real’ cool.” –ALEX WOODWARD

Janna Hart Black, 27

Holder/designer, Bonfolk Collective

Dearest fresh album: I like old stuff, like the Rolling Stones.

Beloved restaurant: Herbsaint

What is your hidden talent? Sewing

A stint in Los Angeles exposed Janna Hart Black to the city’s large homeless population. “I would want to sob driving through Skid Row to get to the garment district,” says Black, a Fresh Orleans native who attended The Style Institute of Design & Merchandising. “I came up with the idea to do a sock line that gives back and is inspired by things everyone loves in [Fresh Orleans]: alligators, crawfish, the Fresh Orleans Saints.”

  Bonfolk Collective launched in January, and &#Ten;now the socks&#Ten;can be purchased in thirty six Louisi-&#Ten;ana stores. Black says she hopes to take her concept to cities across the nation. For every pair &#Ten;of socks purchased, Bonfolk donates a pair to the homeless, since socks are among items that are donated least often. She has given Ten,000 pairs of socks to homeless Fresh Orleanians.

  ”The response is beautiful,” she says. “When I go to shelters, people come up and hug me and say, ‘Thank you. This makes my day.'” – MISSY WILKINSON

Executive director, Finance Authority of Fresh Orleans

Book presently reading: The End of Alchemy: Banking, The Global Economy and the Future of Money by Mervyn King

Beloved local bands: Free Agents Brass Band, The Bridge Trio

Dearest restaurant: The Munch Factory

Damon Burns grew up in Fresh Orleans East and played sports at St. Augustine High School, but when it came time for undergraduate work, he moved on to Atlanta and Houston. He felt the pull of Fresh Orleans, however, and moved back one year before Hurricane Katrina. “I didn’t have big plans at the time,” he says. “The city wasn’t doing that well at the time, and a lot of youthful people were getting worried.” He spent ten years working in investment and corporate banking, but as the fresh executive director of the Finance Authority of Fresh Orleans (FANO), Burns’ job now is to help people get low-interest loans to buy homes in Orleans Parish.

  ”Our mission is significant to me – eyeing low- to moderate-income families get on their feet and get into a stable home life situation.”

  Burns says his life away from finance is packed with reading, family and friends. – KEVIN ALLMAN

Founder and CEO, AxoSim Technologies

Dearest local band: Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue

Drink of choice:&#Ten;A good IPA

Hidden talent: Art (pottery, painting)

The technology Lowry Curley worked on as a grad student and helped launch as an entrepreneur holds the potential to revolutionize the bio-tech industry while also healing patients and saving untold lives.

  While earning his doctorate in biomedical engineering from Tulane University, Curley worked under professor Michael J. Moore, with whom he co-founded AxoSim Technologies. Curley describes as Moore’s “brainchild” a technology “that is basically a miniaturized version of the human jumpy system.” Curley very first began applying for federal grants to fund the venture in two thousand fourteen and embarked business-development operations at the end of two thousand fifteen to put the patent Tulane holds for this licensed technology into the marketplace.

  ”The sky is the limit for the application of this technology,” Curley says. “We’ve seen proof of that in our growth over the last year. This has potential applications in neurological disorders – numerous sclerosis, ALS – that affect so many people.” – FRANK ETHERIDGE

Division business manager, Health Guardians of Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Fresh Orleans

Book presently reading: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

Beloved fresh album:&#Ten;Day Cracks by Norah Jones

Dearest local band: Brass-A-Holics

Health Guardians – a program of Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Fresh Orleans – helps guide people in at-risk communities through an intimidating health system. Patient advocates serve as liaisons through the system, so by the end of the program, patients “are asking all these questions, they understand their conditions, and they indeed feel comfy having that open communication and dialogue with their physician,” business manager Seema Dave says.

  ”The concentrate of Health Guardians is to empower them, to educate them, to connect them with a primary care provider, and to truly instruct them how to advocate for themselves,” Dave says. “It’s indeed taking the time to understand the utter context of their situation, understand their barriers and indeed help them every step of the way.”

  Patients may be homeless and many don’t have basic needs met, and often rely on emergency rooms for primary care or to refill prescriptions. As division business manager, Dave oversees a dozen programs to help “empower people who don’t have a voice.”

  ”I truly love the challenge – the budgeting part, the finance part, marketing, writing,” Dave says. “Anything that’s versatile and challenging, that’s what motivates me. When I see a challenge I just want to go for it.” – ALEX WOODWARD

Maj. David R. Dixon, 36

Helicopter Pilot, U.S. Marine Corps; author

Book presently reading: Hippos Go Berserk! by Sandra Boynton (his daughter’s dearest)

Presently listening to:&#Ten;The Valor Podcast

Hidden talent: Country western, ballroom and hip-hop dancing

In addition to distinguished service in Iraq, Japan and at home, helicopter pilot Maj. David R. Dixon is an award-winning poet and children’s book author.

  ”Marines don’t necessarily emote very well . if you can imagine that,” he notes dryly, making an observation familiar to many with a service member in the family. In response, he created

Goodnight Marines, a children’s book that tells the story of a military family through a petite boy’s nighttime imaginings. The book, illustrated by Army veteran and Disney animator Phil Jones, has sold more than Five,000 copies.

  ”It’s sometimes hard to talk about what we do overseas. . This is a way that, in some petite part, Phil and I can help Marines connect with their families,” Dixon says.

  His very first book, the poetry collection Call in the Air, won a two thousand fourteen award from the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation. For his “day job,” you’ll find him in Algiers and Belle Chasse coordinating aviation operations and training programs for thousands of Marines. He recently orchestrated helicopter trips from Honduras to Haiti as part of the Hurricane Matthew ease effort. – KAT STROMQUIST

Book presently reading:&#Ten;Arcadia&#Ten;by Lauren Groff

Dearest fresh album: A Seat at the Table by Solange

What is your hidden talent? “I’m a bit psychic.”

Lauren Domino had a wish job as the director of the Columbia University Film Festival in Fresh York. But she left it to comeback to her native Fresh Orleans to make films.

  ”I am winging it,” Domino says. “That is the reality of working in film and being an artist. If you want your career to budge forward, you have to devote the time to it.” She had worked for the Fresh Orleans Film Festival and on films before she went to Fresh York City, but moving home has permitted Domino to concentrate on her own producing and writing.

  She and director Angela Tucker dreamed to make a teenage comedy about black damsels, and in December 2015, they finished a $52,000 Kickstarter campaign to create Paper Pursue, about a dame who turns to creative fundraising ideas to attend college. Filming is scheduled to begin in 2017.

  Domino also is working on a teenage dance movie called All Styles, to be filmed in Baton Rouge in December. She recently finished production of American Rhapsody, a series of twelve brief films about black filmmaking that is supported by the Museum of Modern Art and the Library of Congress. Domino also is working on the documentary Blood Thicker about the children of rappers B.G. and Juvenile.

  While she’s glad to be busy bouncing numerous projects, she says she can’t wait to catch up with several TV series with some binge watching if she gets a break in her schedule. – WILL COVIELLO

Bennett Drago, 32&#Ten;A.J. Niland, 32

Playmates and founders&#Ten;of Huka Entertainment

Dearest fresh album:&#Ten;22, A Million&#Ten;by Bon Iver (Niland)

Dearest local band: Maggie Koerner (Niland)

Hidden talent:&#Ten;”I fly airplanes.” (Niland)

Twelve years ago, high school friends Bennett Drago (top) and A.J. Niland launched a puny festival production company, Huka Entertainment, in their hometown of Mobile, Alabama. In 2010, the duo moved the business to Fresh Orleans, creating more than thirty full-time jobs and hiring uncountable other workers during the festival season.

  When the two were in high school, they packed their free time by traveling around to see concerts. They spent everything they made at their summer jobs working for the BayBears, Mobile’s minor league baseball team, going to as many festivals as they could.

  ”We determined we were going to break into the business,” Niland says. “We were living in Mobile and there was nothing going on there at the time, so we embarked promoting ourselves and grew from there.”

  One of their largest festivals is BUKU Music + Art Project held in Fresh Orleans every March. Huka Entertainment has extended beyond the Gulf South and creates music and arts festival practices all over the country and in British Colombia. Drago and Niland travel the country to find prime locations for pop-up music festivals.

  ”I’m most consumed with creating fresh festivals and enhancing current practices,” Niland says. “But indeed, our entire festival business . Fresh Orleans has inspired it. I don’t think we’d be as big or as good if we had not moved to Fresh Orleans.” – ANDREA BLUMENSTEIN

Wellness coach, founder&#Ten;of Footprints to Fitness

Dearest album: Stripped by Christina Aguilera

Drink of choice: Cucumber martini

hidden talent? Drawing

Former health teacher, Fresh Orleans Saintsation and psychology student April Dupre was looking for a career that combined her passions, but she had no desire to own a gym. So in February 2014, she launched Footprints to Fitness, a wellness company that fucking partners with hotels, bars and parks to create events that are part workout class and part cocktail hour.

  ”The Healthy Glad Hour is a blessed hour &#Ten;with a healthy twist,” Dupre says. “We have a low-impact fusion class – yoga, Pilates or barre. We want it to be joy and lighthearted. Afterwards, we have food and cocktails at blessed hour prices.”

  The events take place every six to eight weeks, and each one has sold out, Dupre says. In the future, she plans to transition her company into a nonprofit and host more free community events.

  ”My objective is to give back and switch the perception of what it means to be healthy in Fresh Orleans,” she says. – MISSY WILKINSON

Blair Hodgson duQuesnay, 34

Chief investment officer, ThirtyNorth Investments

Book presently reading: Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow

Dearest fresh album: The Story of Sonny Boy Slender by Gary Clark Jr.

Hidden talent: Getting to the front row of rock concerts

Blair Hodgson duQuesnay proves it’s possible to strike gold while smashing the glass ceiling.

  Chief investment officer at ThirtyNorth Investments, duQuesnay this year implemented the rock hard’s Women Influence Strategy, an initiative established after research demonstrated publicly traded companies possessed by women, or with a higher percentage of females on its board of directors and in executive leadership, had stock that outperformed others by Three.Five percent inbetween two thousand five and June 2016.

  ”That’s a big deal,” duQuesnay says. “Those numbers were indeed compelling to us and we commenced our investment strategy in April.” That strategy includes finding women-led businesses as “social-impact” investments for their clients, earning them a financial re-&#Ten;turn – and the chance to sup-&#Ten;port positive switch for women in &#Ten;the marketplace.

  While urging caution against relying on short-term numbers in the investment world, duQuesnay cites benchmark indexes that demonstrate ThirtyNorth’s Women Influence Strategy has grown by nine percent inbetween April and September. “What’s indeed titillating about this strategy,” she says, “is that it’s an excellent way to make a difference through social-impact investments, and it’s creating a big concentrate nationally among investment-management professionals.” – FRANK ETHERIDGE

Calvin C. “Trey” Fayard III, 37

Founder, CEO, GLO Airlines

Beloved restaurant:&#Ten;Le Petit Grocery

Drink of choice: Bourbon on &#Ten;the rocks

Hidden talent: Playing piano and saxophone

Frustrated by the time he was spending in a car attempting to reach other southern cities, attorney Trey Fayard came up with a novel solution: He embarked an airline.

  ”It was a problem that I recognized needed a solution,” Fayard says. GLO Airlines was born and, as it celebrates its very first anniversary this November, Fayard summarizes the year jokingly by telling, “It’s been like bouncing twenty eight nut sack. I have a lot of brain harm.”

  At present, GLO offers nonstop passenger service to Little Rock, Arkansas, Shreveport, Memphis, Tennessee, Destin-Fort Walton Beach, Florida, and Huntsville, Alabama, but Fayard already is planning more destinations from Fresh Orleans. He wants to proceed to suggest “a first-class product at a reasonable price” and says he’s pleased that GLO permits people to see clients and family more often – and enables those same people to “spend the night in their own bed.” – Laura Ricks

Krystin Frazier, 30

Lawyer, Kelly Hart & Hallman

Book presently reading:&#Ten;The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo

Beloved fresh album:&#Ten;Lemonade by Beyonce

Hidden talent: “I am a classically trained clarinetist and saxophonist.”

After graduating as the valedictorian of her class at Grambling State University, Krystin Frazier attended Southern University Law Center, where she developed an interest in energy and environmental law.

  ”In the area where I am from in north Louisiana, at the time I was graduating from law school, some of the events going on were the Haynesville Shale and talk about fracking and drilling, which sparked an interest in energy and environmental law,” she says.

  An associate at Kelly Hart & Hallman law rock-hard, Frazier represents clients in oil and gas litigation and regulatory matters. She serves on the Women’s Energy Network’s board of directors and has worked to raise funds for scholarships for women interested in careers in the energy industry.

  Frazier is active with the Grambling alumni association and recently chaired fundraising for its Earl Lester Cole Honors College. Besides volunteering with local organizations, Frazier has added weightlifting to her regimen at her gym and likes local cultural events. – WILL COVIELLO

Founder, Gowland LLC

Beloved local band: Rory Danger & the Danger Dangers

Drink of choice:&#Ten;12 Mile Limit’s mezcal-based “Rhymes with Amelia,” which is named for her

Hidden talent: Could once walk on stilts

For Lelia Gowland, “lean in” is the peak of the iceberg when it comes to women’s professional success. She began Gowland LLC in two thousand fifteen as a way to help educate women who struggled with common professional situations such as salary negotiations. But she quickly realized there was a need for a larger-scale project.

  ”Companies are telling ‘We’re losing superb female talent.’ Women are telling, ‘It’s not that I didn’t want to work. It’s that I couldn’t figure out how to take my other responsibilities and align them with my employment responsibilities,'” she says.

  When her consulting company comes to a business, nonprofit or professional association, Gowland identifies existing strengths and helps build rapport with and inbetween female employees. She’s also releasing fresh online courses for individuals, in which women can learn more about strategies for negotiating raises, promotions and maternity leave.

  ”A lot of the abilities [women] have innately . to be good listeners and empathetic and ask good questions, those are the qualities of successful negotiators,” she says. – KAT STROMQUIST

Possessor and head style designer, Tieler James

Dearest fresh album:&#Ten;Climb on Ninji and Da Nice Time Kid&#Ten;by Die Antwoord and City Club&#Ten;by The Growlers

Beloved local band: Ha Jupiter and Dizzy Louisa

Hidden talent: Runway walking and taking care of cacti

When Tieler James came out as gay at age 9, he got bullied – “badly,” he says. He dealt with that adversity in two ways: by making treks to the Louisiana House of Representatives urging state lawmakers to pass anti-bullying legislation and by channeling his emotions into art.

  ”To get away from all the bad things happening to me, I got into design and I kept up with it,” says the 16-year-old junior at Fresh Orleans Center for Creative Arts.

  That’s an understatement. To date, James has won Lifetime’s Project Runway: Threads, shown his collections at regional and international style weeks and been featured in Vogue UK, Glamour UK, Seventeen and other publications. His next purpose is getting accepted to Parsons School of Design for college.

  ”I want to have a style house that is worldwide known,” James says. “I want to embark an empire.” – MISSY WILKINSON

Todd C. James, 36

Principal, &#Ten;Mathes Brierre Architects

Book presently reading:&#Ten;Outliers&#Ten;By Malcolm Gladwell

Dearest fresh album: Coloring Book&#Ten;by Chance&#Ten;the Rapper

Beloved restaurant: Cavan

You expect architects to have an influence on their city, and it’s undoubtedly true of Todd James. He’s worked on our parks, schools, housing, government buildings and courthouses.

  In addition to his work in architecture, regulatory advisement, project management and quality control, he’s also civic-minded, working with the Fresh Orleans Public Belt Railroad, Greater Fresh Orleans Inc., the Youthfull Leadership Council, and the Boy Scouts of Fresh Orleans, among others.

  It all comes together for James: land use, design, project management, development and community engagement. “It’s not always about individual projects, it’s about the greater community,” he says. “A good project brings about good community.”

  James says his work in the community helps his career: “It helps me to learn how to work with a larger demographic of people, especially with a broader range of personalities, a broader range of practices. It’s instructed me how &#Ten;to manage.” – CATE ROOT

Sonya Jarvis, 38

President and CEO,&#Ten;ASI Federal Credit Union

Beloved fresh album:&#Ten;Gore by Deftones &#Ten;

Dearest local band: Down

Dearest restaurant: Baru Bistro & Tapas

Sonya Jarvis pairs her talent for finance with a mission to help others.

  ”The fine thing about credit unions is that they’re member-owned,” says Jarvis, president and CEO of ASI Federal Credit Union. “So instead of focusing on driving up profits, our profits are reinvested to benefit members.”

  Jarvis’ knack for numbers led to her earning a degree in finance from Southeastern University and a Master of Business Administration from Louisiana State University.

  Camped out in a hotel in Baton Rouge after Hurricane Katrina, she learned “every area of operation” for credit unions while working for national regulators seeking to restore these finance cooperatives statewide.

  ”ASI is about serving members from different economic backgrounds,” Jarvis explains, noting initiatives such as Wheels to Work loans to provide transportation for those returning to the workforce. “This aspect of social responsibility is thick for us and drives us to influence and serve the underserved.” – FRANK ETHERIDGE

Katie Johnson, 31&#Ten;Ashley Sehorn, 35

Co-owners, Royal Design House

Book presently reading:&#Ten;The Witches: Salem, 1692 by Stacy Schiff (Sehorn)

Dearest local restaurant: Ninja (when she calls for takeout, they greet her by name) (Johnson)

Hidden talent:&#Ten;Sehorn makes&#Ten;a mean apple&#Ten;cider donut cake

If you had to go one place in the country to make a career in costume design, you could do worse than Fresh Orleans. Now in the thick of their 2nd Carnival season, Royal Design House co-owners Ashley Sehorn (bottom) and Katie Johnson are busy designing, sourcing, sewing, transporting and preserving garments for Mardi Gras royalty and court members in krewes such as Hermes.

  ”We do all of our beading in-house,” Johnson says. “Everything’s palm done, we infrequently ever use glue . it’s undoubtedly a different kind of Mardi Gras costume than a lot of the stuff you’ll see.”

  For fresh costumes, the designers craft ornate mantles and Medici collars from materials largely sourced from Fresh York, where they’ve logged as much as ten miles a day traipsing around the Garment District. During the off-season, they repair and preserve historic Carnival costumes and accessories, which often have intricate beadwork and uncommon metallic fabrics.

  ”Those costumes are irreplaceable,” Sehorn says. “It’s indeed cool to keep the clubs using them.” – KAT STROMQUIST

Laine Kaplan-Levenson, 29

Host/producer,&#Ten;WWNO-FM’s TriPod,Producer, Bring Your Own

Dearest&#Ten;fresh album: No Cargo by Lucy Dacus

Dearest local band: Helen Gillet

Hidden talent: Can sing in Yiddish

How Germans brought gymnastics to Louisiana. Bear fighting in Algiers. A poet-turned-first-ever woman to publish a major newspaper. WWNO-FM’s TriPod: Fresh Orleans at 300 uncovers a sort of secret history of Fresh Orleans and southeast Louisiana, with host and producer Laine Kaplan-Levenson suggesting untold stories and fresh perspectives pulled from the region’s deep bench of history.

  Combining a love for audio as well as history and culture studies, Kaplan-Levenson says “this job was kind of the coming together of all those interests” following a year as the station’s coastal producer.

  ”Fresh Orleans talks about itself a lot and talks about itself in a celebratory way,” she says. “We set out to not only tell stories that have never been told, but identically significant, tell stories that had been told but let another group of people tell them.”

  Kaplan-Levenson also produces the live storytelling series and podcast Bring Your Own (BYO), which has incorporated more issues-based themes – from mass incarceration to renters’ woes to health issues, in conjunction with the city’s Health Department – into its schedule of private, vulnerable and charming true stories. Listeners can subscribe on iTunes or at www.bringyourownstories.com and www.wwno.org. – ALEX WOODWARD

Assistant professor, head of the Department&#Ten;of Criminal Justice, University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Dearest local band: Gal Holiday and the Honky Tonk Revue

Drink of choice: “Rye. Rocks.”

Hidden talent: “Couponing. My wifey can attest.”

David Khey goes the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, which he is working to make a key playmate to criminal justice agencies statewide to “get everyone on the same page,” with agencies working alongside everyone involved in the criminal justice process.

  ”There’s not too many people doing what we do: effectively work with playmates, know the science better, and do their jobs alongside us to understand what we can budge forward,” says Khey, who lives in Fresh Orleans. “Finding playmates that can work together and finding teams that can work together is where the chasm has been.”

  Khey has worked with the 22nd Judicial District Court in St. Tammany and Washington parishes on a behavior health re-entry court program, which is being modeled statewide. Khey also helped implement a vocational training re-entry program at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. He’ll release a book, Crime and Mental Health (Springer), with his wifey Jamie Hector next year. &#Ten;– ALEX WOODWARD

Dr. Vininder “Vinnie” Khunkhun, MD FAAP, 37

Medical director, Fresh Orleans Therapeutic Day Program

Dearest music:&#Ten;David Gray, Eddie Vedder and Jack Johnson

Drink of choice: Gin and tonic

What’s your hidden talent?: Pingpong

As Medical director of a joint program inbetween Tulane University and the Recovery School District, Dr. Vininder Khunkhun helps youth flagged as “troubled” by providing a strength-based treatment to therapy that helps children with emotional and behavioral problems.

  Khunkhun, a psychiatris, also trains resident physicians and medical students from Tulane University School of Medicine.

  At Fresh Orleans Therapeutic Day Program, Khunkhun makes sure that kids who often get written off are assisted with schooling, time at home and medical care. “The idea is that even one attachment figure can make a indeed big difference in kids’ lives,” Khunkhun says.

  He brings his longtime love for sports to encourage kids’ development, including movie games. “We do this by attempting to instruct abilities that they can work together and have joy, like developing kids should have joy,” Khunkhun says.

  In the future, he’s committed to continuing to break down the stigma associated with kids who are suffering from P.T.S.D., depression, anxiety and other conditions that can be treated once identified and converting the Fresh Orleans Therapeutic Day Program into a private nonprofit. – ANDREA BLUMENSTEIN

Shercole King, 33

Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) administrator, VIA LINK

Project director, Teenage Tech Day

Book presently&#Ten;reading:&#Ten;Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Beloved local band: Slangston Hughes & Fo on the Flo

Dearest restaurant: Koreole Cafe & Grocery

Shercole King attended Loyola University and did graduate work at the University of Fresh Orleans before going on to pursue technical studies at Dillard University. She very first became interested in computer coding in college – “I was playing around MySpace and wished to make my page pretty,” she says. “Then I commenced making websites. I didn’t look at it as a career chance at the time.” Soon she was running a site called Good Nola (focusing on positive developments post-Hurricane Katrina) and another called Minority Weirdos. Today she works with homeless programs at VIA LINK, providing data quality and human services software for metro Fresh Orleans groups working with homeless people. She also co-founded Teenagers for Tech, a program to bring technology to youth. Her one-day seminar, Teenage Tech Day, is now in its sixth year.

  Tho’ King was born in the 8th Ward, she grew up and still lives in Fresh Orleans East. “Housing-wise, it’s going good out there,” she says. “It’s leisurely moving when it comes to businesses, but we’re getting a lot of petite local businesses.”

  What does she do for joy? “Glad hours!” – KEVIN ALLMAN

Edward Lada Jr., 37

Vice president of contracts, Goodwill Industries of Southeastern Louisiana

Dearest fresh album: &#Ten;A Moon Shaped Pool by Radiohead

Beloved local band: Groovy 7, Down

Hidden talent:&#Ten;The art of soup making

Edward Lada’s job is to put people to work. In the three years since he came aboard as the youngest person ever in his position at Goodwill Industries of Southeastern Louisiana, he has helped create more than two hundred twenty jobs – seventy five percent of them packed by people with disabilities – while almost doubling his department’s revenue.

  It’s an achie-&#Ten;vement he credits to his staff. Only when pressed about his leadership does he say, “I believe in providing people autonomy and the contraptions they need to do the job. I’m not a big micromanager, but I am big on communication and learning. We practice what we preach.”

  Lada, who wants to be a “Goodwill Lifer,” is studying for his Master of Public Administration degree in hopes of “doing something on a larger canvas.” Many people know Goodwill as a place to donate used items, but the organization also trains people who face employment barriers, such as the disabled and ex-offenders, to find what he calls “self-fulfillment in work.” &#Ten;– LAURA RICKS

Blaine Lindsey, 38

Executive director, chairman and southeast division head,&#Ten;Aledade Louisiana ACO

Founder, Capra Health;&#Ten;former CEO of GetHealthy Inc.

Book presently reading: Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals by Patricia &#Ten;Lockwood

Dearest local band: Rotary Downs

What do you do in your off time?: Ideal my Rain or Shine Uptown Heirloom Moonshine recipe (“It’s my desire hobby.”)

Attorney Blaine Lindsey used a petite provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA, aka Obamacare) to build a business that gives seniors better health care and saves money for Medicare. The ACA provided for Accountable Care Organizations (ACO) to place overall patient care in the forearms of primary care physicians, eliminating duplication of tests and numerous doctor visits. He was motivated by watching his grandfather spend his days in a succession of doctors’ waiting rooms to receive treatment for diabetes.

  ”Nobody was ever working with him as a entire person,” Lindsey says. “He was just floating. That’s what so many of our seniors are doing is floating. It’s very dangerous.”

  To switch that landscape for seniors, he founded the health care start-ups Capra Health, a consulting rigid, and GetHealthy Inc., a health and wellness platform, and joined the national ACO Aledade, where he is executive director, chairman and head of the southeast division. Under his direction, Aledade’s business grew five hundred percent in Louisiana in nine months – and Lindsey facilitated the company’s choice of Fresh Orleans for its regional headquarters. – Kandace Power Graves

Dr. Sonia Malhotra,&#Ten;MD, MS, FAAP, 36

Medical director, Palliative Medicine Program, Ochsner Medical Center

Book presently reading: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Cheryl Sandburg

Dearest fresh album/CD: &#Ten;Views by Drake

Hidden Talent: “Dance!” (She was co-captain of a bhangra dance team in college.)

Dr. Sonia Malhotra initiated the very first pediatric palliative medicine consultative inpatient service in Louisiana at Ochsner Medical Center, where she serves as medical director of the program. In a field that is critically underrepresented and often misunderstood, Malhotra is cultivating a network of caregivers working to improve quality of life for patients with chronic, life-limiting illnesses through improvements in agony management, communication and support systems.

  Malhotra serves as a consulting physician for the Adolescents and Youthfull Adults with Cancer Survivorship Program (AYA) and trains resident physicians and medical students at Ochsner. She was published in the Harvard Review of Psychiatry and has authored several book chapters on anguish management related to her research.

  She is an admitted paramour of Bravo TV and hip-hop music and attributes having a psychiatrist hubby (Dr. Khunkhun, also a forty under forty award winner) in her corner as key to achieving an essential work/life balance. She loves to spend time with her hubby and two children, and they travel the globe to stay connected to family and friends in the U.S. and abroad.

  ”You have to realize that not every moment, or the next, is promised to us,” she says. “My job makes me think about what is significant. . Life is precious and fragile. When I’m at work, being there for my patients and their families is my very first priority. At home, my family comes very first.” &#Ten;– Andrea Blumenstein

Cecile Monteyne, 32

Book presently reading: The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah

Beloved fresh album: Ruminations by Conor Oberst

What is your hidden talent? Doing various parts of The Nutcracker ballet. “I took dance for thirteen years. It was the beginning of my love of performing.”

Cecile Monteyne won an Entertainer of the Year Big Effortless Award for a year in which she starred as Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, played leading roles in Twelfth Night and Shiner and appeared in the one-woman comedy La Concierge Solitaire. Recently, she co-wrote, produced and starred in One Night Stand Off, a comedy film about an improbable duo who go home together after a hurricane party and wind up pathetic and stuck together when the storm strikes.

  While she submits the movie to film festivals, she’s busy working on a multiplicity of projects, including another film and producing her monthly improv project, You Don’t Know the Half of It, at Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre. She also created the concept for By Any Scenes Necessary, in which actors improvise famous plays without using the original scripts. And she is a co-host, as Stella, of the Tennessee Williams Fresh Orleans Literary Festival’s Stanley and Stella Shouting Contest. – WILL COVIELLO

Wesley J. Palmisano, 36

President/CEO, Palmisano Group

Book presently reading: &#Ten;The Advantage&#Ten;by Patrick&#Ten;Lencioni

Beloved&#Ten;local band:&#Ten;Rebirth Brass Band

Dearest restaurant:&#Ten;GW Fins

Since Wesley Palmisano took over the family construction business in 2013, it’s grown from three employees to seventy five and experienced a two hundred percent growth one year after another. But he is building more than physical structures; he’s also living up to his company’s mission statement of “building to have an bearing influence on our community.”

  That happens in many ways. For example, Palmisano promotes company morale through joy events and has an on-site fitness facility where employees can work out on company time – an example of his belief in building excellent places to work and interact.

  But that belief extends beyond his company’s walls and into the community, with projects such as his partnership with PlayBuild NOLA, a nonprofit that trains kids about architecture, design and construction. Calling PlayBuild “the flawless partnership,” Palmisano donated an outdoor classroom in Central City, which he hopes will help children there “find ways to create a better life.” – Laura Ricks

Conun Pappas Jr., 27

Book presently reading: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

Dearest local band: Khris Royal & Dark Matter

Hidden talent: Playing key drums

If you desired to earn a place in Fresh Orleans’ awesome legacy of jazz musicians, you’d need to embark early: pianist Conun Pappas did.

  ”I’m a product of a solid jazz education,” Pappas says. A St. Augustine High School graduate, he polished his talent studying jazz at Fresh Orleans Center for Creative Arts (NOCCA), Tipitina’s Internship Program and the Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong Jazz Camp.

  Pappas graduated with honors from the Fresh School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in Fresh York City and has learned from and performed with Donald Harrison Jr. and Alvin Batiste. Besides playing piano, he writes music. In addition, he instructs youthful people about jazz, working with organizations such as Carnegie Hall, the Fresh Jersey Performing Arts Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center to make jazz music less intimidating to youthful people.

  Pappas splits his time inbetween Fresh Orleans, Fresh York and touring. He performs with fellow NOCCA graduates Joe Dyson and Max Moran as The Bridge Trio, as well as under his own name. – CATE ROOT

Kevin Pedeaux, 33

Possessor, Coast Roast Coffee

Book presently reading: “A special sneak preview of a yet-to-be released book by my former colleague Kurt Fromherz”

Dearest fresh album: Stranger To Stranger,&#Ten;Paul Simon

Hidden talent: Photography

A native of St. Bernard Parish, Kevin Pedeaux worked at Randazzo’s bakery during high school and college, where he discovered “boxing doughnuts at four o’clock in the morning truly deep throats.” But he liked Randazzo’s and the bakery/coffee culture, and found his calling when visiting his family’s summer house in Long Beach, Mississippi, where he met business fucking partner Shawn Montella. The two began roasting and wholesaling coffee to shops all over the metro Fresh Orleans area, eventually opening a coffee house in Ponchatoula. In 2015, Pedeaux opened Coast Roast Coffee in the St. Roch Market, where he also hosts a YouTube talk demonstrate, Coffee With Kevin.

  Pedeaux’s family – dating back to his great-grandparents – grew up “around Piety and Clouet (streets)” in Bywater, he says. Now he, his wifey Ashley (a St. Bernard Parish schoolteacher) and their baby have moved from a house in Holy Cross to one in Bywater. “My great-grandparents grew up around Piety and Clouet (streets),” he says. “It’s like genetic memory for us.” – KEVIN ALLMAN

Victoria Adams Phipps, 29

Executive producer,&#Ten;Fresh Orleans Entrepreneur Week

Book presently reading: The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

Dearest local band: Tank & the Bangas

Hidden talent: “I have a knack for random facts.”

During the five years of Victoria Adams Phipps’ leadership, enrollment in the annual Fresh Orleans Entrepreneur Week grew from about 1,200 in two thousand eleven to more than 13,000 in 2016.

  ”It’s been indeed incredible to see the event scale over time,” Phipps says. “It commenced out of post-Katrina recovery efforts and, as it embarked to catalyze the city’s business activity, we realized there’s a certain magic in bringing all these entrepreneurs together. We didn’t want to have that typical stuffy business conference but an asset for the entire community with public programming and the feel of a festival that you couldn’t practice anywhere but Fresh Orleans.”

  Phipps points out that Fresh Orleans operates at sixty four percent above the national average for start-up activity and ranks 2nd in cities for information technology jobs for women.

  ”I have passion for the work I’m doing,” she says, “because I’m sultry about the power of entrepreneurship to trans-&#Ten;form communities.” &#Ten;– FRANK ETHERIDGE

Katy Hobgood Ray, 39

Assistant director of marketing and communications, Tulane University

Founder/director, Confetti Park Players

Dearest local band: “My dearest local songwriter who doesn’t get enough fame is Greg Schatz.”

What do you do in your off time?&#Ten;”Work out at Friday Night Fights” on Oretha Castle Haley Boulevard

Hidden talent? &#Ten;I was Trixie la Femme with the Big Effortless Rollergirls from 2006-2010

Kathryn Hobgood Ray uses music to instruct children about Louisiana culture and history. On weekdays she’s assistant director of marketing and communications at Tulane University. On her off hours, she is director of Confetti Park Kids, a group of twenty five 4- to 11-year-olds who perform at local festivals and whose very first recording, 2015’s We’re Going to Confetti Park! won a Parents Choice Award. She also hosts and produces the weekly kid-friendly radio showcase and podcast Confetti Park, featuring Louisiana music, artists and stories on WHIV-FM.

  ”Art and music have been constants in my life,” Ray says. “It’s brought me the greatest joy, and also it can be very comforting when times are hard as an outlet of expression. . I think I’m sharing that device with [the children].”

  The group began when Ray, a musician, began holding informal singing circles at Confetti Park in Algiers when her son was youthful. The circle expanded and the group has performed at the Algiers Folk Art Festival, Fresh Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, French Quarter Festival and others.

  ”It’s an chance for the children to come together in a group . and do this creative brainstorming,” Ray says. “They have a entire different skill set that they’re developing besides practising music.” – Kandace Power Graves

Alice Riener, 37

Chief legal and policy officer,&#Ten;wNO/AIDS Task Force dba CrescentCare

Book presently reading:&#Ten;Kindred&#Ten;by Octavia Butler

Dearest local band: Kelcy Mae Band

Alice Riener was in law school in Washington, D.C. when she came to Fresh Orleans to help with the recovery after Hurricane Katrina. She had a strong interest in human rights law – so she knew right away what she desired to do after graduation: “I dreamed to live in Fresh Orleans and be part of the post-Katrina revival,” she says.

  Today she’s an executive with CrescentCare (formerly known as the NO/AIDS Task Force), a nonprofit that provides primary medical care to Five,000 patients – including psychiatric and dental care – at three local clinics.

  Why does Fresh Orleans proceed to have one of the nation’s highest rates of fresh HIV infections? “It’s the lack of sexual education and lack of primary medical care,” Riener says. “And the demographic of 13- to 24-year-olds here is one of the highest groups for (being freshly infected).”

  In her spare time, Riener is restoring a Craftsman-style house she bought off Freret Street and doing some gardening around her property. Asked what her secret talent would be, she said, “I don’t know – I can string up some Sheetrock, maybe!” – KEVIN ALLMAN

Dr. Scott Schultz, 38

Dearest local band: Galactic

Beloved restaurant: Parkway Bakery&#Ten;& Tavern

Hidden talent:&#Ten;”I can always&#Ten;get my friends&#Ten;to laugh.”

While an undergraduate studying biology and theater at Tulane University, Scott Schultz knew he desired to live in Fresh Orleans. After completing medical school at George Washington University, he discovered his interest in the recovery phase of medical care while doing a residency at UCLA/VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System.

  He pursued a fellowship at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and returned to Fresh Orleans to set up Louisiana’s very first interdisciplinary pediatric anguish program at Children’s Hospital, now one of only two in the state. Schultz treats rehabilitation and medical management for patients recovering from brain and spinal cord injuries, neuromuscular disorders, congenital spinal disorders and musculoskeletal conditions. Working with others, Schultz takes a holistic treatment to managing anguish and helping patients come back to their normal lives.

  ”[We attempt to] effectively manage their agony from a medical standpoint, a psychological standpoint and a physical therapy standpoint so they can get back into the community functioning like a teenager should,” Schultz says. “They should be playing sports, having joy and going to movies.”

  Schultz also sees patients in Baton Rouge and Lafayette, and when he’s not working, he likes to go to shows at local music clubs, attend festivals and explore Fresh Orleans City Park. – WILL COVIELLO

Billy Slaughter, 36

Beloved fresh album: The Getaway by Crimson Hot Chili Peppers

Beloved restaurant: Port of Call

Hidden talent:&#Ten; “I can shred some Guitar Hero and I accept all challengers.”

Billy Slaughter is a proud born-and-raised Fresh Orleanian with a slew of acting credits including latest releases The Big Brief, Daddy’s Home, The Magnificent 7 and Jack Reacher Two. These roles have Slaughter, who graduated very first in his class from the University of Fresh Orleans’ drama program, working opposite Hollywood starlets like Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke and Tom Cruise. He also scored a reference – and an invitation to Los Angeles – from actor Dustin Hoffman. Slaughter considers himself proof that the film industry has given locals many amazing opportunities.

  ”It is very infrequent to be able to make movies in your hometown,” he says. “When filming here, it is doubly nostalgic. I create fresh memories from filming, but also realize that this is down the street from my very first smooch. It truly brings past, present and future all into view.”

  Two of his films, Cold Moon and Arceneaux, aired in the latest Fresh Orleans Film Festival. &#Ten;  In his free time, he’s all about stringing up with his ladies: his wifey Nicole (whom he met doing plays at Climb on Carmel) and daughter Charli.

  Slaughter presently is helping produce a literary biopic. The subject matter is hush-hush, but Slaughter says it is something closely related to Fresh Orleans. “I want to help get Hollywood South back on its feet,” he says.

  In the future, look for this entertainer to round out his growing resume with credits as writer, starlet and producer for a project of his own. – ANDREA BLUMENSTEIN

Leigh Thorpe, 35

Vice president of&#Ten;resource development and marketing,&#Ten;United Way of&#Ten;Southeast Louisiana

Dearest restaurant: Cavan

What do you do in your off time?: &#Ten;Walk around Lakeshore Drive

Hidden talent: Movie trivia

At United Way, Leigh Thorpe spends her working hours helping people. It’s also how she spends her time when she isn’t working.

  Thorpe has served a number of local nonprofits, from Save Our Cemeteries and Dress for Success to Children’s Hospital, Hogs For The Cause and others.

  ”I happen to be good at logistics and operations, so doing an auction for a nonprofit is effortless for me,” Thorpe says. “And if I spend a few days on something that brings in $20,000, I can’t say no. I love helping nonprofits.”

  Thorpe’s latest project is Friends of City Park, where she is proud not only of how “much more beautiful and usable” the park is since Hurricane Katrina, but also for her chance to introduce it to a fresh generation.

  ”The fact that I get to be an advocate and get more people involved is truly arousing,” Thorpe said. “Some people have kids. I have the park!” – LAURA RICKS

Content analyst,&#Ten;FSC Interactive;&#Ten;creator, MissMalaprop.com

Beloved&#Ten;local band:&#Ten;Robin Barnes

Dearest restaurant: Bennachin

Hidden talent: Ballroom dancing

Mallory Whitfield is a Renaissance woman who does everything from craft shows to haul performing. She’s a digital marketing specialist, entrepreneur, blogger, speaker, performer, author and artist who helps petite businesses grow their brands.

  A founding member of the Fresh Orleans Craft Mafia, she began blogging in 2006, instructing herself the digital marketing abilities that would land her a full-time job at FSC Interactive in 2014.

  In addition to her work there, she mentors teenagers and a tribe of “bad-ass creatives.” She created and maintains this community via weekly newsletters, Instagram posts, a Facebook group, in-person workshops and Tech School, a blogging conference she launched in 2011.

  ”Life is truly brief,” the Loyola graduate says. “Art is how we cope with things and connect with ourselves and other people. Figure out ways to make things and do things that are significant to you, because that’s how we create a life that is worth living.” – MISSY WILKINSON

Executive director, College Beyond

Beloved&#Ten;local band: “Tonya Boyd-Cannon and Mykia Jovan are two of my beloved voices”

Beloved restaurant: Square Root

Hidden talent:&#Ten; “I love to sing!”

Paris Forest knows that first-generation college students need extra help, and with her nonprofit College Beyond, she’s attempting to connect students with resources they need.

  Originally from St. Louis, Forest is the very first member of her family to graduate college and graduate school – from Harvard, no less. But that achievement was just the beginning of a career built in education. She has worked in outreach and recruitment, academic advising and in admissions and financial aid offices.

  She brings the sum of this skill and practice to College Beyond, the nonprofit she co-founded in two thousand fifteen to help low-income, first-generation college students succeed in college.

  ”I’m a first-generation college graduate myself,” she says. “College was a truly significant practice for me because it exposed me to all that is possible. . But it also showcased me the vast inequity that we have when it comes to education. That sort of foundation made me interested in leveling the playing field.”

  Forest cites a statistic that, nationwide, only nine percent of students that come from the lowest quartile of income graduate college, compared with almost eighty percent in the top quarter for income. Narrowing that gap, she says, is her calling. – CATE ROOT

Dearest local band: Alexis and&#Ten;the Samurai

Drink of choice: Three fingers of whiskey in a glass. Add ice if it’s above 70F.

What do you do in your off time: “I love building robots.”

When 3-D printing becomes household technology, Cole Wiley will have played a part.

  His startup, Scandy, makes 3-D scanning and printing from a smartphone possible. That one step – mobile access – is significant, but it’s not enough.

  ”We’ve been focusing on building out the underlying technology,” Wiley says, working on “middleware,” the software that connects hardware on your electronic device with the software of an app. What kind of apps can the middleware permit developers to create? Maybe an app for virtually attempting on clothes, or designing custom-made garments.

  Wiley calls himself a “sculptor and digital menace,” and it’s hard to figure out which half of that appellation is more surprising for a chief technology officer.

  But the relationship inbetween these two identities, artist and software developer, is what makes Wiley a visionary.

  Wiley also founded Makers of NO in 2013, which hosts a makerspace (a technology version of DIY projects) at ArtEgg and weekly tinkering meetings. – CATE ROOT

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