NEWS
The former state representative cut the ribbon at 5301 Elysian Fields Avenue on Saturday, with a City Council proclamation, a brass welcome from Girls Play Trumpets Too, and a tribute to his late sister's career in the arts.
By Kim M. Braud | October 10, 2026
NEW ORLEANS - Attorney Juan LaFonta opened the new home of the Juan LaFonta Law Firm at 5301 Elysian Fields Avenue on Saturday morning, cutting the ribbon in front of neighbors, former classmates, an old professor, and a City Council member who once ran a campaign out of the same building.
The weather cooperated. Days after Hurricane Isaias kept the city on watch and then passed it by, the ceremony took place under a bright, clear sky.
Before the speeches, the young musicians of Girls Play Trumpets Too led the crowd in "When the Saints Go Marching In," then played it once more at the emcee's request.
A building with a campaign history
At-large Councilmember Matthew Willard presented a proclamation on behalf of the New Orleans City Council recognizing the opening. It was the only proclamation presented at the ceremony.
Willard told the crowd the building had a history he shared with LaFonta.
"Many of you probably know this was actually my campaign headquarters last year when I ran for the council at large race." - Councilmember Matthew Willard
He said LaFonta approached him about buying the building to use as his office, and that both men live in the area. Willard described LaFonta as a longtime figure in city life who served in the state legislature, chaired the Black Caucus, and worked on recovery after Hurricane Katrina.
LaFonta represented House District 96, which takes in Gentilly, Treme, and the Faubourg Marigny, from a 2005 special election until 2012. He became chairman of the Louisiana Legislative Black Caucus during his first term. He founded his personal injury practice in 2002.
Friends from every chapter
Winston Burns, a local businessman and former music executive, said he met LaFonta at a radio station when LaFonta was 17. He recalled the teenager telling him, "Look, I don't know what I'm gonna do, but I know I'm gonna be a success."
"Juan loves New Orleans. He truly loves it." - Winston Burns
Judge Kimya Holmes of Orleans Parish Criminal District Court said she and LaFonta attended undergrad together and graduated from Southern University Law Center in the class of 2000.
"I grew up in Gentilly, about five minutes from here. So everything that you do and that you bring to this community, we're appreciative of that." - Judge Kimya Holmes
Dr. Raphael Cassimere Jr., professor emeritus of history at the University of New Orleans and the university's first Black faculty member, spoke last before LaFonta. He recalled meeting financier Louis Roussel in 1971, who told the newly minted PhD he would never get rich teaching.
"I never became rich, but in finding a job that I loved, I became very rich."
Cassimere said LaFonta was one of many students who came to his office to talk about sports, politics, and careers, and that he came to consider LaFonta one of his "academic sons." He said LaFonta told him early on that he intended to become a big-time lawyer, and that LaFonta later helped fund UNO’s Juan LaFonta Multicultural Lounge, which opened in 2021.
"My students became the source of my riches."
"This is my street"
When LaFonta took the microphone, he thanked God and the ancestors, his wife Angie, and their baby, who turns three months old next week.
He said he rejected the architects' first concept for the building and its colors.
"We're gonna do something that's for our community, not some stuff that looks like some pop-up out of some book that could be a hospital, prison, or whatever."
He credited Pillar Construction, which he said is led by a Gentilly native, with seeing the project through.
LaFonta then explained why the location matters. He grew up on Elysian Fields. He described riding the bus up and down the corridor until he was 18, keeping his transfer tickets long enough to get downtown and back because he could not afford another fare, and not bothering with a driver's license because the bus took him everywhere he needed to go. On those rides, he said, someone always knew his uncle Dennis or his mother, who taught school for 40 years.
The boy who rode the bus, he told the crowd, now has a building on the bus route.
He tied that history to the community events he funds, including the Juneteenth fireworks on the lakefront. He said that when he was 7, he told his grandfather that one day they would shoot their own fireworks, and his grandfather told him he would.
"The people of this community deserve, not entitled. We have worked to deserve a better community that's reflective of the work and the history and the ancestry of this area."
The boy who rode the Elysian Fields bus now has a building on the bus route.
The art inside, and the sister behind it
LaFonta told the crowd that the art they would see on the tour of the building is connected to his sister, Dána La Fonta, who worked for the Louisiana Division of the Arts and died six years ago. He described her as the state's director of arts for about 16 years.
He used her career to make a point about who gets support in the arts.
"If she would have had more people investing in art, supporting her art, supporting her career, she may have been here longer. And I think it's on us to really make a statement to help people."
He said women are too often overlooked in the state, the city, music, theater, and art, and that he wanted the young women in the crowd to hear that.
Gumbo rules and the countdown
LaFonta closed with a pitch and a punchline. First, the pitch: he asked the crowd to send him their accidents and their clients. Then the line anyone who knows him has heard before: if you put weenies in your gumbo, or raisins in your potato salad, you are not from his community.
His final point was about the next generation. He said the community had done a great deal for one kid, and asked what would happen if it did the same for more of them.
When I cut this ribbon, it's gonna be for prosperity, for Gentilly, but it's going to be for all those kids going forward."
He said he hoped those kids would grow up with their own Pontchartrain Beach and their own Ferrara's, and a community that tells them, "Baby, no matter what you're doing, we're gonna help you get to where you're going."
The crowd counted down from 10, the ribbon fell, and guests went inside for the tour.
Music and food
The music that opened the morning came from Girls Play Trumpets Too, a New Orleans nonprofit founded in 2022 by trumpeter and music educator Troy Sawyer. The program teaches girls ages 8 to 19 to play the trumpet, with the goal of increasing the number of women in a section of the band long dominated by men.
The idea grew partly from Sawyer’s own experience. He grew up with few women trumpeters as role models. Seeing talented women play challenged assumptions he had carried for years.
The program goes beyond lessons. Students learn classical and jazz alongside the history of women musicians who were overlooked. The program also builds in leadership and community service. It began with eight young musicians and now has nearly 100 registered girls, according to the organization’s website. The ensemble has performed at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, French Quarter Festival, Satchmo SummerFest, and Gentilly Fest.
Their place at the front of Saturday’s crowd matched the point LaFonta made later from the microphone: that women are too often overlooked in music, theater, and art, and that the young women listening should hear otherwise.
The food came from B Sweet Bistro & Bakery, owned by Brittney “B Sweets” Walker. Her restaurant and bakery sits at 704 North Rampart Street, across from Congo Square and Louis Armstrong Park.
Walker’s path to the business did not start in a kitchen of her own. According to her official biography, she worked as a Walmart baker and later as a meter maid. As a single mother, she made a birthday cake for her daughter, Bailey, and that cake became the inspiration for the B Sweets brand. Custom cakes and desserts remain at the center of the business.
Her North Rampart storefront opened in early January 2022, according to Eater New Orleans. It drew early attention for its king cakes and a menu of New Orleans comfort food, including gumbo, red beans, and fried catfish. The NFL’s New Orleans visitor guide later featured the restaurant, highlighting its 704 Gumbo and seafood-stuffed beignets. Walker also runs The Sweet Escape, a private event venue.
Given the host’s gumbo rules, the menu was in safe hands.
Kim M. Braud is the Founder & Editor of Evans Cutchmore Press, an independent newsroom covering Louisiana and the Gulf South, and the author of Financial Power for Life™, a financial literacy framework that helps people earn, protect, grow, leverage, and transfer wealth. Her reporting focuses on government accountability, infrastructure, business, culture, and the public policies that shape communities.
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