WE WERE SOMEWHERE on the edge of Central City, just north of midtown, when reality began to take hold.
The deadliest district of the deadliest city in America. Murders daily, violent crime amuck. And there we were: property development professionals, an accountant, a law student, and an acquisitions intern.
Why?
Lunch, actually. Were you expecting something a bit more substantial? I'll continue.
We had just taken a tour of the multi-family development units throughout dilapidated, abandoned apartments, schools, and churches. Some were well under development and renovation, soon to become affordable apartment housing for the elderly. It's part of HUD's Section 202 initiative, and my employer is working to develop those properties into quality housing for those New Orleanians who have spent decades and decades in the city they love and wish to return to.
But this isn't about housing. I spend enough time at work on that subject. I'll leave that for another time.
This is about lunch.
Terri, our head of finance, suggested Cafe Reconcile as a lunch destination, as she directed her sizable SUV along the bumps on Esplanade Avenue. Cafe Reconcile, I thought, interesting name. As we headed toward the restaurant, I noticed we were turning on to Martin Luther King Jr Blvd. Uh-oh, I worried. The street forms one side of the triangle-shaped area known as Central City, an area I was strongly told to avoid. And we're traveling down it? Surely there are eating options in safer parts of town...
We found a tight parking space and headed to the patio of the cafe. Opening the glass doors revealed a lively scene. Nearly every seat filled, the open kitchen roaring, waiters scattered about, scurrying from one table to another. Nice place, I surmised. Guess it's worth the risk of getting here. I still didn't understand the hype...evidently community leaders, business people, and public officials from all over the city frequent the place regularly. Walking to the table, I glanced at some of the dishes on other tables. Seemed well enough but...what was it about this place that attracted so many powerful people in New Orleans?
And that's when I met the owner.
Cafe Reconcile is really a beautiful organization. It's tough to call it a restaurant, it's so much more than that. The group takes at-risk youth from Central City and other areas of the city and puts them to work at the restaurant, to keep them out of trouble, to teach them valuable job skills, and mentor them to keep them away from the drugs, violence, gangs, and other elements in their communities that can completely ruin their lives. Sure, this business model has its hiccups: the teens forget an occasional order, maybe drop a drink now and then. But the smiles on their faces no matter what the difficulty, no matter what the issue. Our waiter was a young kid, with bright eyes, a starched white shirt and black slacks, and the brightest white teeth, which he flashed all the time through his brilliant smile. It never faded. You couldn't get waiters this nice, polite, and kind anywhere. Really remarkable.
For the record, I had a po-boy. Dressed, of course.
I looked at other tables. Lots of professionals and executives, enjoying a home-cooked style country meal in the roughest part of town, talking it up about every which subject. Like anywhere, "the storm" was a frequent conversation topic. It always. But still, looking around at the patrons, it was quite a thing to behold, but it paled in comparison next to the sight of the hard-working kids, their heads held high, their priorities in order, all thanks to the folks behind Cafe Reconcile.
I learned something that day, something that didn't have to do with adjudicated properties or the inconsistencies of real estate databases. I learned that even in the hardest of times, in the roughest of areas, the power of mentorship, of guidance, of holding out a helping hand to those so often deprived, can defeat all those forces which work to leave life in ruined squalor. Poverty, drugs, broken families, murdered loved ones...everyone working at Cafe Reconcile has seen these horrors first hand. And when all seemed lost, an amazing opportunity arrived to help change these lives for the better, to give them a running start in the working world.
With their big smiles, those kids reminded me that we cannot turn a blind eye to the roughest part of town. We cannot simply tell ourselves, "Oh, there'll always be a rough neighborhood in the city. There'll always be poverty. So what good can we do?" There's plenty. And the cafe showed that in a very real, tangible (and delicious) form. And on a personal level, as a capitalist libertarian, I was quite happy to see a non-profit, privately funded and managed organization provide such a social service, without governmental intervention or (potential) mismanagement. But the important thing is, lives are being changed, futures are being secured, and a better tomorrow lay in store for a group of kids fortune forgot.
Zagat might find fault with a few dishes, but no one can argue that Cafe Reconcile is a real gem. de Gaulle said something that seems really apt for the place, and really, for New Orleans as a whole. So, I'll leave you with that:
It is not tolerable, it is not possible, that from so much death, so much sacrifice and ruin, so much heroism, a greater and better humanity shall not emerge.
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