EVANS CUTCHMORE PRESS

Civic Commentary

They Got The Warning, We Got The Bill. | Evans Cutchmore

The City of New Orleans was warned in writing in June 2020. Business owners on Newton Street documented the harms, asked for a response, and never got one. Three years and nearly $1.4 million later, Algiers is still paying for it.

News Analysis

They Called It Obsolete | Evans Cutchmore

There is a particular cruelty in declaring something obsolete that was never truly built. BREC is preparing to sell eight small parks in Baton Rouge, most of them in North Baton Rouge, in neighborhoods that are predominantly Black and economically under-resourced. These were not parks that wore out

Louisiana Politics

When the Deal Gets Done Before You Know It Exists: Holly Ridge, Hyperion, and Who Pays the Price

In December 2024, Meta broke ground in Holly Ridge on a data center it calls Hyperion. At $27 billion and 4 million square feet, it is projected to become the largest data center in the world. President Trump has held up visuals of it at Cabinet meetings. Mark Zuckerberg has compared its eventual fo

Education

Every American Deserves to Know How Money Works | Evans Cutchmore

Financial Power for Life™ started as a high school curriculum, Louisiana Department of Education Personal Finance Clearinghouse-approved, HB 52-compliant, and the first of its kind written by a minority Louisiana native. That was the milestone. It was never the finish line. Today, the program expand

News Analysis

Google Is Emailing 13-Year-Olds to Remove Parental Controls | Evans Cutchmore

When Google emails the child directly, they are doing more than providing information. They are creating a power dynamic. The child now knows that Google has given them a choice. The child now knows that continued parental oversight is optional. Even if the child does not act on that knowledge immed

Economic Justice

Rev. Bryant Does Not Speak for Us - The Target Boycott Is Not Over | Evans Cutchmore

One pastor cannot negotiate away a movement built by millions. Target did not reinstate its DEI programs, did not restore its Supplier Diversity commitments, and confirmed no policies were reversed. What Rev. Bryant is calling a "victory" is a press conference - and we are not accepting it as a sett

Civic Accountability

Louisiana Changed How You Vote - and Most People Don't Know It Yet | Evans Cutchmore

If you vote in Louisiana and haven't checked your voter registration lately, now is the time. Governor Jeff Landry quietly rewrote the primary rules for millions of voters - and the first election under the new system is May 16, 2026. This isn't a minor procedural tweak. It affects who can vote in w

New Orleans Policy

New Orleans Needs HB 573. Here’s Why You Should Contact Your Legislator Today.

If you live in New Orleans, you already know the story. A main breaks. Water pressure drops. The boil water advisory goes out - sometimes for days. You call SWBNO and get a bill you don't recognize. You contest it and wait. Meanwhile, no one seems to be in charge. That accountability gap has a legal

Louisiana Politics

Two Bills, One Pattern: Louisiana Moves to Dismantle Reentry Infrastructure | Evans Cutchmore

Two bills moving through the Louisiana Legislature this session would, taken together, dismantle nearly all of Louisiana's statutory infrastructure for reentry workforce development - and so far, almost no one outside the Capitol seems to know either one exists. House Bill 296 proposes to repeal the

Energy and Economy

When the World's Oil Spigot Shuts: What the Strait of Hormuz Crisis Means for Louisiana | Evans Cutchmore

On the morning of March 1, 2026, no commercial ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz. Not one. The waterway that carries roughly one-fifth of the world's daily oil supply had gone effectively dark. Within days, gas prices in Louisiana jumped more than 30 cents per gallon. Brent crude climbed pas

Entrepreneurship and Small Business

Why Scalability Isn’t Always the Goal - When Sustainable Beats Explosive Growth | Evans Cutchmore

Scalability has become the gold standard in entrepreneurship, but growth for the sake of growth can break a business that isn’t built to support it. Sometimes the smartest strategy isn’t explosive expansion, it’s sustainable growth that allows a company to remain stable, profitable, and resilient ov

Agriculture

Domino Sugar: The Sweetest Brand Built on Black Bones | Evans Cutchmore

Bad Bunny's Super Bowl halftime show featured sugar cane as a cultural celebration, but the symbol tells a darker story about corporate accountability and economic extraction. My latest piece examines Domino Sugar's empire: from its founding during slavery's final years through the 1887 Thibodaux Ma

Federal Policy

I'd Want a Choice: Why New York's Medical Aid in Dying Law Matters | Evans Cutchmore

I've never had to watch someone I love die slowly, in pain, with no hope of recovery, until now. A friend who fought cancer for ten years just lost her battle. Before that, she watched her husband die from the same disease. I keep thinking: if it were me, I'd want a choice about how my story ends. T

News Analysis

College Sports Is Getting Richer. Athletes Still Aren't Ready. | Evans Cutchmore

College football jerseys are about to look a lot more like professional sports uniforms. With NCAA programs now allowed to sell commercial patch placements and mandated to share millions in revenue directly with athletes, college sports is shedding its amateur pretense fast. This essay examines the

Community

Why Community Leadership Strengthens Your Content Strategy (Not Just Your Reputation) | Evans Cutchmore

Community leadership is often treated as a reputational asset, but its deeper value is rarely discussed. This essay argues that proximity to real people and real consequences doesn’t just enhance credibility; it fundamentally changes the quality, authority, and durability of content. Drawing from li

News

“You Big Dummy”: Why Lamont Sanford Mattered to Black America | Evans Cutchmore

Sanford and Son was more than a sitcom for Black America; it was a mirror. At the center stood Demond Wilson as Lamont Sanford, the quiet, grounded son whose restraint gave the show its truth. This essay reflects on Wilson’s life, legacy, and why Lamont mattered, not as the joke, but as the steady p

News

The First Amendment Is Not Conditional | Evans Cutchmore

At the heart of these arrests is a far more dangerous question than any single protest or charge: Who still gets to speak freely in America, and who does not? When journalists, particularly a gay Black journalist and a Black woman journalist, are criminalized while federal agents who killed Alex Pre

New Orleans Policy

Why New Orleans' Data Center Moratorium Is Actually a Win (Even If It Doesn't Feel Like One) | Evans Cutchmore

What does it look like when passion meets process in city government? Today's New Orleans City Council vote on data centers showed exactly that: residents demanding an outright ban, a 6-1 vote for a moratorium instead, and a room full of frustration. But the moratorium isn't the compromise; it's act

New Orleans Policy

The Inheritance of Disorder: What the Cantrell Administration Leaves Behind for Helena Moreno | Evans Cutchmore

As LaToya Cantrell exits office, New Orleans faces a sobering reality: years of controversy, stalled execution, and eroded trust have left the city in need of repair. The incoming administration, led by Helena Moreno , inherits a city demanding transparency, accountability, and results. This transit

News Analysis

We Don’t Need Another Sneaker Tribute. We Need a Seat at the Table. | Evans Cutchmore

Nike's LeBron "MLK" sneaker, a $210 tribute inspired by the Lorraine Motel, wasn't just tone-deaf. It exposed who holds power in the rooms where Black history becomes marketing material. The issue isn't the colorway or LeBron's involvement. It's who held veto power in the process, and who didn't. Dr

Investigations & Special Projects

The Inconsistency of Honoring Legacies: A Call for Fairness | Evans Cutchmore

Marie Justine Cirnaire Couvent left land in 1837 to educate Black orphans, creating a legacy rooted in empowerment and access. Yet today, the Archdiocese of New Orleans has chosen to sell the school founded on her land to settle abuse claims, while her name has been stripped and her vision sidelined

New Orleans Policy

How a 16-Month Notification Gap Led to a Special City Council Meeting: A Case Study in Civic Engagement

You don't need to be a political insider to fix broken government systems. You need to identify the problem, research the solution, and show up. Here's how I'm doing exactly that before Wednesday's New Orleans City Council meeting, and how you can replicate this process in your own community.

Entrepreneurship and Small Business

Why Audiobooks Are Outselling Hardcovers in 2025 | Evans Cutchmore

The shift did not happen overnight. It happened quietly, in cars, on sidewalks, in kitchens, and on treadmills. It happened while people were living their lives. Reading used to require stillness. A chair. A lamp. A stretch of uninterrupted time. That version of reading still exists, but fewer peopl

News

When History Quietly Aligns: Supporting Nouveaux Renaissance and the Legacy That Connected Us | Evans Cutchmore

I didn’t know she was writing the book when I first told her about my work with Holy Redeemer School and the effort to preserve the legacy of Marie Couvent. What unfolded instead was a quiet revelation: our projects were already connected by history. The school Couvent made possible didn’t just educ

Investigations & Special Projects

The Inconsistency of Honoring Legacies: A Call for Fairness | Evans Cutchmore

The removal of Marie Couvent's name from the school she founded is emblematic of a wider inconsistency in how we honor historical figures. The New Orleans school board, as part of its initiative in the 1990s to remove the names of slaveholders from public structures, stripped her name. However, this