Podcast appearances and mentions of lafayette high

On todays show the Future Foursome talk about, AI in education, Starlink backup, military GPS, 3D tissue printing, AI-generated porn, privacy legislation, job interview cheating, AI regulation, natural gas production, sustainability policy, podcast system, Lafayette High rebuilding, cyber truck features, robot lawn mowers, futurist predictions., AI education, finance exam strategy, Kanye West controversy, Microsoft layoffs, Tesla Cybertruck sales, VPN blocking, sports streaming, natural gas data center, AI in learning, digital clock, sustainability policy, Holly Ridge data center, human behavior, commercial interruptions. Don't mis this packed episode!

The Maverick Robotics team from McCutcheon High School in Lafayette took home a world championship in a robotics competition. And IMS President Joe Hale is stepping down just months after the museum completed a large renovation.

Our Friday Night Lights series continues as we go inside the Lafayette Bulldogs with Coach Williams. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/vujadesports/support

Tammy Theriot and Bryant DeLoach of Home Bank, Member FDIC, join Discover Lafayette to discuss how banks can assist business owners achieve their financial goals, along with treasury management solutions. Bryant Deloach serves Home Bank as a Senior Commercial Relationship Manager. He has lived in Lafayette his entire life, graduating from Lafayette High and USL, and raising his family here. Starting out 23 years ago in financial services Bryant has spent 12 years in commercial lending. Tammy Theriot started out with Home Bank in 1985 as the 28th employee of the bank when she was 21 (now there are over 400 employees) and has dedicated her entire professional career to the bank, starting out as a teller at the Oil Center branch, moving into opening new accounts, handling IRA administrative services, and then moving into the Deposit side over the past twenty years, currently serving as Treasury Management Officer. "I've grown into that position." She joked that she's been married to her husband for the same length of time: 39 years! Both bankers stressed the importance of building a relationship with their clients. Bryant shared that "as a commercial relationship manager, our #1 priority is to provide service to our client. We have to understand their borrowing needs, if any. You meet a lot of great people and help businesses grow. You're involved in decision making, helping a client take their business to the next level. It's important for the client to be matched with a banker that understands their specific needs. At the end of the day, you want your client to feel comfortable with you." "It's important to know your customers and their needs. We can make the collection and payment of funds easier and more efficient," says Tammy Theriot. Her role in Treasury Management starts on the front end of the banking relationship, putting systems in place to optimize financial management and planning. Managing payables through Direct Deposit and ACH payments, handling receivables via Remote Deposit Capture, optimizing liquidity via account management services for optimal cash positions and maximal returns, and safeguarding against fraud and risk by employing tools such as Positive Pay and account monitoring, are all services offered by Home Bank. With check fraud running rampant, Positive Pay is an important risk-management tool to consider for your business. How does it work? The client submits a daily file to the bank that includes details about each check issued, such as the check number, date, payee, and amount. When a check is presented for payment, the bank compares the details of the presented check against the check file provided by the client. If the check details match what is in the file, the bank processes the check for payment. If it doesn't, the bank will flag the check and notify the company to determine if the check will be approved or rejected. Home Bank is the last bank, headquartered in Lafayette LA. Originally chartered as a savings and loan association known as Home Building and Loan in 1908, Home Bank has experienced incredible growth over the years, currently having assets of $3.34 billion dollars, 43 locations across Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, and 476 employees.   Bryant DeLoach assists business owners get working capital needed to fuel their business. Small businesses and startups can apply for a Home Bank loan guaranteed by the U. S. Small Business Administration's (SBA) 7(a) loan program. The 7(a) loan can be used for various purposes, including Working capital, equipment, real estate, refinancing existing debt, expansion or renovation, starting a new business, or inventory purchases. He also advices his clients to ask for advice from their banker to avoid exposure to unnecessary loss. "Customers don't always realize the importance of getting advice from the bank. An example given was one client who had provided debit cards to all employees; the safer route was to issue ...

A fight over the sale of a PlayStation led to a student being stabbed at Lafayette High School in Buffalo. Riverside teacher Marc Bruno discusses what more needs to be done to protect students.

Lafayette native Brennan Robideaux. recently made big news with the release of his film, Born to Fly, a feature documentary about another Lafayette native, pole vaulter  Armand “Mondo” Duplantis. Born to Fly is a coming-of-age tale about one of the greatest athletes of our generation. Mondo Duplantis is the best pole vaulter in history; he currently holds the world record indoor and outdoor pole vault titles, and won a Gold Medal at the 2020 Summer Olympics. This story is about love of craft and the determination of Brennan Robideaux, a young filmmaker who risked everything to capture an evolving story. He travled on his own dime for much of the filming of Born to Fly, was taken under the wing of the Duplantis family as they allowed him to travel with them to Europe to capture their son's pole vaulting competitions, and only came to acquire financial assistance after several years of filming and editing the footage that would become an historical documentary, Born to Fly. Brennan Robideaux says, "I'm very passionate about telling Louisiana stories. My main one I'm working on now is the 1991 gubernatorial election with Edwin Edwards and David Duke. That historical story hasn't been delved into and my generation, frankly, was born after it. We have no idea about this election. I want to make a film that tells how we got to that point. Louisiana loves emperesque dictators. We love eccentricities in Louisiana." Brennan started getting jobs while in high school at STM by filming local athletics. He realized he could make a living in film, and enjoyed taping live events for television. He moved up, becoming a camera operator, filming football games from a perch 40 feet high in the end zone for hours at a time. Brennan loved working with adults while still a youngster and joked that he earned the nickname "Two Cents," probably due to sharing his opinion on how things should be done a few too many times! He counts his blessings that by the time he became serious about cinematography, the quality of digital cameras mimicked what you would expect to see from a true film camera. The cost barriers were lower. Traditional film such as used by director Quentin Tarantino are cost-prohibitive for emerging filmakers operating on a budget. A short film, "A Riehl Blacksmith," featuring Sam Riehl, another STM student who was the youngest professional operating as a blacksmith in Louisiana and America, was a breakthrough accomplishment for Brennan. He says, "This short film really taught me how to tell a story in a short period of time." The short won a few awards: Filmconvert (a New Zealand filmmaker software company) awarded Brennan a cinematography honor, and Soul Pancake, a company founded by Rainn Wilson (of "The Office" fame) licensed the short and put it on its YouTube channel. It was enough to excite Brennan to look at this avocation as a career. And, he was only a Senior in high school. Brennan was invited to attend NFFTY (National Film Festival for Talented Youth) in Seattle due to the success of A Riehl Blacksmith. While he wasn't able to attend, it was the only film festival he made it into until Born To Fly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNzKXBiYcV8 Brennan attended UNO for a short time but dropped out to pursue his passion of filmmaking. By the time he was 21, he was back in Lafayette living with his parents and looking for a project to energize him once more. That motivational project came to life in 2017 after Brennan read a story in the Daily Advertiser about a Lafayette High student named Mondo Duplantis, the world junior record holder in pole vaulting. Brennan was familiar with the Duplantis family as the parents were both incredible athletes (Greg Duplantis was one of the best pole vaulters of his time and Helena represented Sweden in the heptathlon at international championships), and both participated at LSU in track and field events at the same time as Brennan's own parents,

Tanner Napier, Wide Receivers coach & Jason Fergerson, Defensive Coordinator AND also, my childhood & high school teammates, join Unfinished... Lafayette High School! Lexington, KY! Back where it all started.  This episode was really special to me and what this show is about. Reflecting on our lives and making an impact on those coming up behind us. We talk about football, friends, family, & life. Enjoy our 1st 3-way episode of Unfinished and share it with someone you think needs to hear it! Follow on social media @PodUnfinishedThanks for your support of the show! I can't tell you how much it means to me. - Anderson Miller

Dr. Jason Cormier of Lafayette Surgical Specialty Hospital joins Discover Lafayette to share his phenomenal story of success as well as overcoming trials and tribulations. He is not only a renowned neurosurgeon, but he is also a race car driver, accomplished musician, inventor, and author of the newly released "Driven" which he wrote to encourage others on ways to overcome seemingly impossible obstacles. A native of Lafayette, Dr. Cormier is a graduate of St. Thomas More. At LSU, he played point guard alongside Shaquille O'Neal and Chris Jackson under the tutelage of Coach Dale Brown and played pro ball for a brief time in Europe. He went on to graduate from LSU Med School and was a neurosurgery resident at the University of Alabama at Birmingham for six years where he trained in complex spinal surgery.  Dr. Cormier has been named one of America's top Surgeons in the field of neurosurgery by the Consumers Research Council and Guide to America's Top Surgeons and has worked extensively with Traumatic Brain Injuries and assists NCAA Football, the NFL, NASCAR, the Jockey's Guild, various rodeo organizations and other sports representing athletes in high-contact sports.   Since 2014, he has been listed in the “Leading Physicians of the World” for Neurosurgery, and recognized as an international expert in brain injury and concussion. He has been awarded the Castle Connolly Top Doctor in the field of Neurosurgery, and recently served as the 19th President of the Society of Brain Mapping and Therapeutics, an international organization working with experts to improve the diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation of patients afflicted with neurological disorders. Humble in the recounting of his story, Dr. Cormier says, "No one stressed education more than my mother" who taught science at UL-Lafayette and at Lafayette High for many years. He wanted to play in the NBA but when his career was cut short his mom pushed him to pursue higher education. Always being good in science, medicine was a natural fit. Specializing in complex brain surgery which includes vascular neurosurgery and arteriovenous malformation (a tangle of blood vessels connecting arteries and veins, which disrupts normal blood flow and oxygen circulation), Dr. Cormier says he handles about 95% of the aneurisms that come into Lafayette. He also performs minimally invasive procedures to take out tumors in the brain and treats brain trauma. Dr. Jason Cormier is proud of the team he works with at Lafayette Surgical Specialty Hospital and gives them much credit: "It's a team effort. You can't do it alone in a silo as one human being. You need a team. I tell every single patient I operate on that I have a good team backing me up and that I have the good Lord. I believe that from start to finish when you walk in the door. Buffy Domingue, CEO, and her administrative team are also a big part of that." Dr. Cormier credits Lafayette Surgical Specialty Hospital for being the first to bring in the MiRus IO Expandable Lumbar Interbody technology which allows him to perform less invasive spinal neurosurgery on people suffering from degenerative disc disease. Cleared for use by the FDA in August 2021, the MiRus IO allows the surgeon to enter collapsed disc space and expand it by inserting the device into the disc. This minimally invasive procedure calls for a 26 mm incision versus the traditional 26-inch incision. When operating in a small corridor such as allowed by the MiRus IO, outcomes are dramatically changed for spinal surgery patients. There is less blood loss, the patient can get up and walk on the same day as the procedure, and there is a reduced need for pain medications. The MiRus IO Expandable Lumbar Interbody Technology utilizes MoRe® Rhenium-based Superalloy technology, a noncorrosive metal that is the strongest in the world. It is non-corrosive and far superior to nickel or iron inserts which can cause pain in patients. Dr. Cormier says,

Old Skule Nerd makes a special Monday appearance with Shannon to talk about the lockdown at Lafayette High School.

Dr. Kip Schumacher, founder of the Schumacher Group (now SCP Health), one of the largest healthcare management companies in the U. S., joined Discover Lafayette to discuss his medical career journey and creation of the William C. Schumacher Family Foundation which funds charitable initiatives focused on improving quality of life, education, crisis response, and healthcare measures. Erica Ray, Director of Operations for the foundation, also joined us. Kip is a Lafayette native, having attended Hamilton Elementary School and Lafayette High. He graduated from USL (now UL-Lafayette) and LSU Medical School. A successful entrepreneur at an early age, Kip made costume jewelry from brass, silver, and gold wire to fund his higher education. His creations caught the eye of Barbara Abdalla, and the iconic Lafayette retailer, Abdalla's, was the first to buy from him. While he started out in pediatrics, Kip would moonlight in the ER and he fell in love with emergency room medicine. It was an environment where he got to know people of all ages from all walks of life and he realized how challenging access to medicine could be for so many people. He worked for 17 years as an ER doc at Opelousas Medical Center and it was there that Kip realized there had to be a more efficient way to treat patients while helping the hospital make the financial side work. In 1980 when Kip started working at Opelousas General, the hospital contracted separately with each doctor. Kip approached the management team with a proposal to let him manage hirings, payroll, scheduling, and medical malpractice claims; he witnessed how effectively the doctors worked when they operated as a team rather than as separate independent contractors answering to the hospital. His chance to expand his management acumen came about when a doctor friend at Iberia General approached him to take over their administrative operations when he retired. Kip found the work rewarding and it followed his calling to provide the type of medical service they did at Opelousas General. His mission was to provide quality care for the patients and he came to understand that success was dependent upon all of the healthcare providers working as a team, and respecting one another. This team concept in medicine was relatively new at the time. Kip had learned that it wasn't his prescribed treatment that made a difference in patient outcomes, "It's everything around that patient that makes a difference." He endeavored to ensure that each team member from the ward clerk, the nurses, and the doctors, were respected. "That was the strategy that led me down the path of starting Schumacher Group. It's a simple philosophy that I've found has held a lot of people back, not just in medicine, but in business in general and in life. They don't stop and look at the people around them and realize that their lives are so dependent upon people that they don't show the respect that they could. Look at everyone around you and see how they fit into the grand scheme of what it is you're trying to accomplish." He established the Schumacher Group in 1994 with the goal of helping hospitals streamline their Emergency Room operations with staffing, scheduling, billing, insurance, and quality management. Kip grew the Schumacher Group from managing the ER services at 10 facilities in one year to 50 facilities in 5 years. After experiencing exponential growth over the years, Schumacher merged with other companies to widen its array of services. Today, SCP Health is one of the largest healthcare partners in the country serving over 8 million patients in 30 states. Kip's dream of bringing his caring touch to help our most vulnerable get the most efficient access to healthcare has truly become a reality. "One thing I've learned is that if you have a really good mission and a vision that you can communicate very effectively, it makes success a lot easier. You'll attract the kind of people who believe ...

Yvette Girouard, legendary softball coach, joined Discover Lafayette to discuss her incredible career on the 50th anniversary of the enactment of Title IX which made it illegal to discriminate in educational programs that receive federal funds. A native of Broussard, Yvette served as head softball coach at UL-Lafayette from 1981 to 2000, and then at LSU from 2000 to 2011. She won over 75 percent of her games on the collegiate level. Yvette has been named coach of the year by three separate conferences: the SEC (four times), the Sun Belt (2000), and the Southland (1984, 1985 & 1987), as well as Louisiana Coach of the Year 13 times. Yvette Girouard is one of the most accomplished coaches in NCAA Division 1 History. She is one of only 3 coaches to take two teams to the Women's College World Series. She has been inducted into the Louisiana Softball Coaches Hall of Fame, the UL Lafayette Athletic Hall of Fame, LSU Athletic Hall of Fame, the Louisiana Hall of Fame in Natchitoches, and the National Fast Pitch Coaches Hall of Fame. Today, many of us take equal opportunities in sports, especially for women, for granted. But for Yvette, who attended Comeaux High School and then USL before Title IX had taken root, the opportunities were slim to none. The only sport available to Yvette was softball. And there were no scholarships offered to the women volleyball players. Yvette began playing softball in Lafayette at 18 and was picked up by a New Iberia team the next year; both were slow pitch teams. She had never seen fast pitch softball until she was 19 and saw men playing. Fastpitch softball is a fast, underhanded throw clocked at speeds of up to 70 mph. Yvette says at 43 feet, that pitch is comparable to one Nolan Ryan would pitch in his heyday. In 1976, Yvette was hired at Lafayette High to coach fastpitch softball. One catch: there was no softball field for women and Yvette and volunteers had to build their own field. She says, "I hand-tilled the infield." After four years at Lafayette High, she returned to work for her family's restaurant, Ton's Drive-In in Broussard. Then in 1981, USL called and offered her a job coaching softball. Once again, there was no field, and more amazingly, no player scholarships to entice good players. The team consisted of walk-ons, mainly from Baton Rouge, Lake Charles, and Houston which had established fastpitch teams. It took quick work to get it together; Yvette was hired in October and their first game was the next February. In those days, the kids played all the games and didn't specialize in sports. Getting the USL softball team was a Girouard family effort. Her mom made the first uniforms, taking the men's discarded basketball warmups and converting them into pants. Her dad gave her a truck to use to store the team equipment. Her starting part-time salary was $3,000 and she continued to work part-time at Ton's to make ends meet where other coaches could call her to schedule games and work out arrangements. After 10 years as she had become full-time, her salary was $25,000.00 and she had cajoled seven scholarships from USL for recruiting players. At the end of her tenure, there were eleven scholarships awarded each year. Dr. Ray Authement had promised to build Yvette a softball field, and she recalled the location being the old dairy farm before Cajundome Blvd. or Bourgeois Hall had been constructed. A bull greeted her on her first visit to the property. In no time, Yvette's teams grew in national stature as well as became quite popular in the local community who grew to love attending games and rooting on the girls. "Our softball games became the event you wanted to be at. It became my passion. It became my child. I gave birth to it and it kept getting bigger and bigger. And I could sell it. I'm a Cajun girl, I graduated from here. Once we became really, really good, my girls were the Cinderellas of the town." Even with success,

Aspiring Princeton student Stacy Anderson unravels the mystery of Lafayette High's iconic snare drum found destroyed at the top of the clock tower – oh, and the dead janitor. Can Stacy track down the murderer and their motive despite her low GPA? Today's episode features special guest Camila Frausto. Cast: Libby Genz, Dana Daniele, Katy Hennen, Becky Hughes, and Camila Frausto. Editing and production by Drew Harrison and Becky Hughes. Music by Meghan Rose. Artwork by Dave Daniele. Sound effects from FreeSound.org. Additional sound effects: https://freesound.org/s/365064/, https://freesound.org/s/326920/.

Lindsay Smythe, School Leader and founder of Ecole Saint-Landry in Sunset, a free, public French Immersion elementary school, joins Discover Lafayette to discuss her journey in offering a quality educational experience to our youngest students. Lindsay is a bilingual educator with 17 years of experience in education at the elementary, high school, and university levels. She always knew she wanted to be a teacher, and she brings a sense of joy and adventure to the classroom. She received a Master's in Education from LSU. Upon deciding that she wanted to pursue a Doctorate in Education, Lindsay learned that she would have to be fluent in a foreign language to earn her doctorate. She had never studied French and to accomplish this task quickly, she registered at "Débutant Une" (level one) to attend one of the only French Immersion universities in the world: Université Sainte-Anne in Nova Scotia, Canada, which is also the original home of the Acadiens who were deported from the region in 1755. Lindsay fell in love with the French language, as well as the Nova Scotia landscape. She describes it as a beautiful area...."There is no better place than this, with warm, friendly people. Picture the most beautiful Festival weekend here and that is Nova Scotia in the summertime." Lindsay Smythe quickly became fluent in French by attending Université Sainte-Anne in Nova Scotia, Canada. She recommends the experience to others who want to experience a wonderful education as well as a beautiful cultural experience. The university is situated where the Acadiens were deported in 1755 and therefore has many things in common with Acadiana. Summertime French immersion programs are offered twice each year and for those over 60 years old, tuition is half-price. Louisiana residents are accorded the additional benefit of qualifying for the Canadian price of admission. For more information, visit https://www.usainteanne.ca. She stayed on two years teaching French at Université Sainte-Anne and then returned to the United States to teach French at Lafayette High. During her tenure there, she was named the 2016 Lafayette Parish Teacher of the Year and also nominated as the Louisiana Foreign Language Teachers Association Teacher of the Year. Lindsay Smythe is a passionate spokesperson for a great public school system as well as for compensating teachers at a level that will entice the best and brightest students to enter the profession. She learned while teaching in Canada that teachers are paid at a much higher level than in the U. S. and the demand for jobs is incredibly competitive. Teachers typically have a wait time of five years to qualify for a permanent role as a teacher, having to first work as a long-term sub to earn their stripes. In December 2016, Lindsay was summoned to an exploratory meeting called by Stephen Ortego and Sunset Mayor Charles James to discuss the possibility of starting a French immersion elementary school. The building that used to house Sunset High had been sitting vacant, owned by the Town of Sunset, and Ortego had realized its potential as a site for a French Immersion school. As a French teacher and resident of Sunset, Lindsay immediately saw the value of the idea and jumped in headfirst. Local teachers and education doctorates Michelle Haj-Broussard and Nicole Boudreaux drafted the Charter language, and Ecole Saint-Landry was officially approved by the St. Landry School Board as a Type 1 Charter school in 2018. Ecole Saint-Landry is in month five of its inaugural school year at this point, with 55 students in Kindergarten and 1st Grade. There are five teachers, all fluent in French necessitated by the fact that no English is spoken in the classrooms. The school is available at no charge to St. Landry residents and transportation is provided at satellite bus stops by the St. Landry Parish School System. No child has to travel more than five miles to access the bus transportation.

In this episode we talk to Andy Scott, Head Football Coach at LaFayette High School. Coach Scott is starting his 12th season as a head coach including stops at Kennesaw Mountain and Perry High Schools before going to Lafayette.

Family is a big deal in Acadiana. That can be quite literally true. Family trees are large and deep-rooted, and that grounds a lot of us here. This area is known for having among the highest population retention in the nation. That doesn't necessarily make being a teenager in Acadiana any easier. Defining who you are and who you want to be can be challenging. All the more so perhaps as the community diversifies and what it means to be from Acadiana becomes more complex.  Angst is angst wherever you are. And growing up in Acadiana can throw some unique challenges at you. There's a dark side to joie de vivre. And in that shadow depression, anxiety and alienation lurk for teenagers coming up in a thorny world.  Roy Petifils helps high schoolers navigate all that as a professional counselor. At one time, Roy sought a career in the cloth, but left the seminary to work at St. Thomas More Catholic High School in Lafayette. He figured out quickly that he connected better with students one-on-one than at the whiteboard and made the career switch to faith-based counseling. He's an author, podcaster and public speaker and practices at Pax Renewal counseling center in Lafayette. Roy is also the host of the podcast, Today's Teenager. Historically, Acadiana's unique culture has been a grounding force folks growing up here. That's come through tremendous effort over the decades to preserve and promote Francophone heritage in the region. The effect has been powerful for our traditions — music, food, art — but not necessarily for the French language.  Speaking French natively is still waning, observes Lindsay Smythe Doucet. There was a time when most of us had a native French speaker in our families, but that's not necessarily the case anymore, even as the broader culture has persevered.  Lindsay has taught French and English in the public school system for over 15 years, most notably at Lafayette High. In 2021 she'll make the leap into running a brand new French immersion elementary school in Sunset: Ecole St. Landry. The program emphasizes dialect and conversation in its curriculum, instead of harping on conjugation and grammar. The goal here is to teach kids a language in a way that allows them to express themselves, to get on Twitter or Instagram and TikTok and play with French in the same way they do their native tongue. The school will open with 100 kids. See photos by Lucius Fontenot from this show, recorded over lunch at The French Press, at our website. And there's more lunchtime conversation about Acadiana families here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Daniel "Danny" Landry, candidate for District Attorney for the 15th Judicial District Court (covering Lafayette, Acadia, and Vermilion parishes), joined Discover Lafayette to discuss the upcoming election on November 3, 2020, and the reasons he has always wanted to serve the public as their District Attorney. A lifelong Lafayette resident, Landry is a graduate of Lafayette High, LSU, and LSU Law School, and has worked for the DA's office since 1984 where he served as Felony Assistant DA in the 15th JDC for over 35 years. In his early days with the office, DA Nathan Stansbury took him under his wing, mentored him, and demonstrated the leadership qualities that have shaped Landry's career and molded his work ethic with a focus on public service. Landry currently serves as First Assistant DA under the current District Attorney, Keith Stutes, who is not running for re-election. His job duties include supervising budget and management operations of the DA’s office, and prosecution of major cases. The office has close to 100 employees and works to administer and prosecute misdemeanors and felony offenses, which are "Title 14" crimes under the criminal code. Funded through 14 different sources of revenue, Landry believes that public safety issues should be a top priority. "If you have good public safety in a community, people want to come in, locate their businesses and homes there. Arts and culture can thrive." Landry is particularly proud of the case management system he implemented which "brought the DA's office into the 21st Century." With 26 law enforcement agencies throughout Lafayette, Acadia, and Vermilion parishes reporting to the DA's office, under the pre-existing paper-based filing system it was possible for arrest documents to be "lost" or fall through the cracks. Utilizing the new electronic tracking system for the past four years, the DA is now better able to meet the mandated 30-day review of charges, keep track of the average prison sentences meted out for crimes by judges, respond to calls from the public, and keep the entire justice system accountable to the public. Danny Landry with his wife, Nancy, and their children Morgan, Kelly and Chris. Landry also serves as the Pretrial Intervention Director which is designed to assist first-time offenders to examine the underlying reasons for their criminal behavior, such as socioeconomic circumstances, mental health issues, or lacking access to needed resources. He explained that many overlapping issues can lead to survival reactions such as a young woman in poverty stealing diapers for her newborn or a boy stealing bread and lunch meat because no one is taking care of him at home. These non-violent offenders don't need to be incarcerated but they do need direction and guidance counseling to get their lives on a better course to keep them from returning to the justice system. Known for his work on major felony cases that garnered national interest, Landry reminisced about the Mickey Shunick murder investigation that "out of all the investigations and prosecutions, was one of the best executed I've ever been involved with." Thousands of tips were gathered and the team of Stutes, Landry, Alan Haney, and Roger Hamilton coordinated with many law enforcement agencies that led them to forensic evidence pointing to Brandon Lavergne, who they determined had also killed another person. Mickey Shunick's remains were unearthed in Evangeline Parish behind a pauper's graveyard. "If you had to write a book about how to prosecute, this was the case. Mickey was finally returned to her family." Danny Landry, along with DA Keith Stutes, as they interview on NBC Dateline discussing the prosecution of Brandon Lavergne in the Mickey Shunick murder case. "If you had to write a book about how to prosecute, this was the case. Mickey was finally returned to her family." Landry is proud to work with the capable law enforcement agencies in our area.

Kyle Bacon, head of Jones Walkers' Lafayette office, joined Jan Swift of Discover Lafayette to discuss developments in downtown Lafayette, as well as today’s commercial business climate. A Lafayette native and graduate of Lafayette High, UL-Lafayette, and LSU Law School where he was on the Louisiana Law Review, Bacon is a co-leader of Jones Walker’s commercial transactions team. His clients’ interests include oil and gas, banking, real estate, healthcare, and manufacturing. The Lafayette office of Jones Walker is one of 13 offices the firm has across the country and is the largest law firm situated in downtown Lafayette with 17 lawyers on site. Jones Walker began in New Orleans and has had a presence in Lafayette for over 30 years; the Lafayette group was its first office outside of the New Orleans market. Situated at the top of Chase Tower on Jefferson Street, Bacon's office offers a bird's-eye view of downtown activities. The firm's typical clients are midsize to large and most are in need of business defense matters. Bacon's work focuses on the transactional side of law and he explained that one of the benefits of hiring a large law firm is that they can offer specialized counsel in complex issues that may involve out-of-state matters. Bacon is a proponent of seeing the continued growth of downtown and says, "It is the front porch of our community. Downtown is the epicenter of our cultural identity here in Lafayette and Acadiana. It's an important connector to the university and it's critical that we keep downtown vibrant. Festival International is such a symbol of what Downtown is all about. It's the center of our community where everyone feels welcome. We can all come together and feel as one." "Downtown is the epicenter of our cultural identity here in Lafayette and Acadiana. It's an important connector to the university and it's critical that we keep downtown vibrant. Festival International is such a symbol of what Downtown is all about. It's the center of our community where everyone feels welcome." Most law firms used to be located downtown which made sense as that is the locale of the Lafayette Parish courthouse and other court-related entities. Over time as South Lafayette has expanded, many lawyers have set up shop across the parish. Bacon believes that the trend could be reversed if local government officials made a concerted decision to focus efforts on downtown development. He compared this to how downtown Baton Rouge has blossomed in the past twenty years with state government's push to concentrate its offices downtown in lieu of being scattered across the city. This focus in our State Capitol spurred more development as downtown flourished and enjoyed renewed activity after years of decline. With the dedicated professionals of Downtown Development Authority working on attracting residential housing and more retail, and the commitment of LEDA's Opportunity Machine and Lafayette Convention & Visitors Commission to locate downtown, he's hopeful that more may follow suit. Bacon stated that "these developments can spur additional activity. Other folks will follow. Downtown settings also allow people to interact easily; we're social beings." Growing up off Johnston Street in Lafayette, Bacon remembers the times when downtown was dormant. He discussed how dead downtown similarly looked during March and April 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 shutdown. When businesses were allowed to reopen in May, downtown started coming back to life but with the resurgence of the pandemic, it's a little slow again. Jones Walker survived the chaos in getting their offices back to work after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and remembered lessons learned from being a New Orleans-based law firm dealing with the aftermath. They never missed a beat in welcoming visitors and clients when the shutdown occurred in March 2020; they check temperatures of everyone entering their offices,

Erick Knezek, Navy veteran and founder of Oceanetics, Inc, , joined Jan Swift of Discover Lafayette to discuss his company's newest FDA approved COVID-19 medical device, the NRSAVR-100, otherwise known as the "nurse saver." The device was developed with the expertise of Dr. Doug Clement, an ER doctor affiliated with Our Lady of Lourdes in Lafayette, who is currently treating COVID patients, was instrumental in starting the virus screening program at the Cajundome, and has helped develop methods for testing and keeping healthcare workers safe. Dr. Clement and Knezek are personal friends and discussed the hazards healthcare workers face when treating COVID patients, as well as the rapid rate in which the hospitals' PPE (personal protective equipment) is depleted as staff move from room to room. In a typical scenario when a patient is intubated, the physician wears an intubation hood ("splash shield") for protection from the potential release of droplets from the patient's airways, but the support staff surrounding the doctor are still subjected to the aerosolized virus particles. A concurrent and expensive need in hospitals treating COVID patients is to have sufficient isolation rooms that keep the patient from spreading the disease to others. Negative pressure rooms are utilized to maintain lower air pressure inside the room so as to keep contaminated air from escaping into non-contaminated areas and infecting others. These rooms are expensive and in relatively short supply. With guidance from Dr. Clement, Knezek created a design for the nurse saver to create a closed air system that surrounds the cephalic region (head, neck, and shoulders) of the patient with plexiglass and rubber barriers. The device has two valves that pump in air from the hospital's ventilation system but keep contaminated air from being released back into the room. Six rubber shrouds contain armholes so that healthcare workers can stick their arms in to access the patient to intubate, hook up monitors, insert tubes, or deliver medications without breaking the seal. The contaminants are sucked out by the nurse saver which filters the contaminated air. The design was tweaked a bit after testing and the final prototype has received FDA Emergency Use Authorization. Dr. Doug Clement demonstrating how the NRSAVR-100 ("nurse saver") effectively seals in contaminated air exhaled by COVID-19 patients. Photo by Leslie Westbrook of the Advocate. Combining the nurse saver with PPE the staff wears dramatically increases the workers' safety. As a comparison, when a patient is on a ventilator, the air is exhaled into the room, thus necessitating a negative pressure room to prevent contamination of the space. Utilizing the nurse saver affords a much more cost-effective solution ($3000 versus the cost of converting space into negative pressure rooms), allows the patient to be transported within the hospital, and eliminates the need for staff to change PPE at every room entry and exit. The device also allows the patient to be flipped to lay on their stomach (proning), to help keep the patient's lungs open. The first few of the nurse savers have been given to Lafayette General Health and feedback is being provided. The nurse saver is the only negative pressure cephalic environment device on the market at this time. While there have been no sales yet, Knezek expressed his hope that the medical community will see the exceptional value the device provides and its ability to increase isolation capacity 100 fold. For more information on the nurse saver, visit https://www.intubationhood.com/ or https://www.oceanetics.com/. Knezek is a graduate of Lafayette High and the US Naval Academy who earned a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Ocean Engineering. He served in the Navy as a Seabee Officer deployed in Bosnia-Herzegovina as a dive officer, with a focus on anti-terrorism infrastructure and port security barrier development and installation.

Cassie Doyle joined us on Discover Lafayette to discuss her screenwriting career and success in having several Lifetime movies to her credit at the young age of 27. We invited Cassie's childhood friend, Taylor Marie Swift, to join us in this special episode where we reminiscence about her focused journey to hone her craft and pursue her dream of creating films. A Lafayette native, Cassie is becoming well-known for writing feature-length films that successfully make it to television screens. For Christmas 2019, two of her movies premiered on Lifetime and are entitled The Road Home for Christmas and Radio Christmas. In 2018, two other Christmas films Cassie wrote aired on Lifetime, A Christmas in Tennessee, and A Christmas Contract. A Christmas Contract was filmed right here in Lafayette. Cassie graduated from UL – Lafayette in Moving Image Arts. She moved to NYC in 2015, initially served as an assistant for a small jewelry design company, then as an Assistant at A & E Networks where she made contacts in the industry and started writing. She is a member of The Writers Guild and is currently working on new projects that aren’t related to the Christmas season. Cassie understood early on that relationship building is important in the film industry, just as in any other endeavor in life. While she worked as an administrative assistant in NYC, she attended various networking events where she made friends in the industry. A contact led to her pivotal job at A & E Networks. She also volunteered at various creative workshops and was always writing scripts, always ready to respond to a call for her work. She befriended higher-ups at the A & E Network who were willing to give her a hand up when she was ready to submit her first Christmas film script, even though she didn't yet have an agent. Her efforts and willingness to work hard, plus a shot of "luck," opened a door that is continuing to open wider and wider for this young talented woman. Cassie loves to travel, and has visited thirty countries as she has written her travel blog, Cassie Finds, sharing her favorite things to do, or not do, in exotic locales around the world. The future looks bright and wide open for Cassie Doyle, who now works independently and is working to fulfill her next dream of working on a series. Best wishes, Cassie, and thank you for sharing your love of Lafayette, your family, and your craft with Discover Lafayette!

Robert Billeaud, who has always been known as "Popie", is our guest. He serves as President of JB Mouton, the construction company established by his great-grandfather, John Berchman Mouton, in 1915. This interview gives the listener an opportunity to hear Popie speak of his love of building and the satisfaction the team at JB Mouton derives from creating structures built to withstand the test of time. As Popie tells clients, "You can pay for the building but it will always be ours!" One of 17 children raised by Lillie and Manning "Bozo" Billeaud, Popie was raised in a warm and loving family. While Bozo encouraged all of his children to follow their own path in life and "just get an education," Popie always loved the construction business. A graduate of Northeast Louisiana (now UL-Monroe), he studied Construction Management and joined his father at JB Mouton in 1976 as a Project Manager. The success of JB Mouton is attributable to its reputation for integrity and the ability to get the job done on time, if not early, with quality workmanship. Popie explained that building skills are such that you either have them or you don't, that you can't teach the innately given craft of building. So the company looks for team members with that gift and nurtures them and their talent, while always challenging the team to build the best building they can. Ongoing craft and safety training are important components of the company's culture. JB Mouton has built many of our community’s most iconic landmarks, schools, and churches such as the LITE Center, St. Pius Catholic Church and Elementary School, ESA’s lower school, CGI, the IberiaBank Tower in River Ranch, Moss BMW and Kia Sterling. They’ve also renovated St. John Cathedral, the Academy of the Sacred Heart, the Cajun Dome, Hub City Ford, IberiaBank Tower downtown, and St. Charles College in Grand Coteau. Chase Tower (formerly FNB Towers)The LITE CenterSt. Thomas More Football Stadium Surviving economic ups and downs and two World Wars has not been easy for the company, and the early days were tough. JB Mouton was originally a farmer who turned to carpentry to make a living. A jack of all trades, he learned the craft of building in early jobs he worked on, and in 1915 started building homes on his own. An early remodeling job JB Mouton took on was the home of Joshua Hays and Mary Laboye Town, the parents of A. Hays Town. Town was only 14 years old at the time and drew up the architectural plans for the remodel. He was so talented that he was hired by JB Mouton to draw up other plans and Town would recount later that his first commission ever made was paid by JB. By the 1930s, JB Mouton's sons, Bill and Francis, joined the firm and they began working commercial construction. U. S involvement in WWII resulted in the rationing of supplies so the firm put its work on hold with Francis going into the service and Bill taking their equipment to Fort Polk to be of service to the military. By 1949, Popie's father, Bozo, went to work at JB Mouton with his granddad and uncles. Commercial construction projects were in high demand and one of Bozo's first jobs was a contemporary A. Hays Town building on the airbase in New Iberia. The ensuing years led to the building of Pecan Island High School, Crowley High, Carencro High, and remodel/additions to Lafayette High, Woodvale, Alleman, Comeaux High, J. W. Faulk, and S. J. Montgomery. In the mid-1960's, JB Mouton added two stories to UL's Dupre Library, and Bozo joked that no books got wet in the process! The firm also built Lafayette's airport in the early 1960's and remodeled it in the late 1980's. From 1973 to 1975, JB Mouton worked on the construction of FNB Tower, now known as Chase Tower, designed by Jerry Gossen and Don O'Rourke. It is still the tallest building in Lafayette, LA. This iconic project was the first time that JB Mouton utilized the now commonly used design-assist-build process,

"Liam Doyle has been had mobility issues since he was born. He used a walker to get around in elementary school, but shifted to a chair in middle school because the campus was larger and he had to get around to classes. He graduated from Lafayette High, one of the largest high schools in the state that operates on a campus built 50 years ago to accommodate a student body about half the size of the one there now. He's 28 now, working on an associate degree in History at South Louisiana Community College and plans to attend UL Lafayette when he finishes up his last class in the next semester. He's just passed the battery of tests needed to show he has the capacity to drive a car. And he's got his hands full working with Lafayette Consolidated Government to improve physical access to public spaces and businesses in the City of Lafayette. He chairs the Mayor-President's Awareness Committee for Citizens with Disabilities, so is pretty officially in the business of removing barriers to access. Even though LCG is the parish government here, because of we have semi-consolidated government here LCG has no authority in the small municipalities that remain in the parish after Lafayette lost its mayor and council to the parish. It's a complicated yet subtle form of discrimination against city residents who provide much of the funding for the parish. In the podcast of our conversation, Doyle says he's found his voice and maybe his calling in the role of advocate for the disabled in Lafayette. It was the role that thrust him into the public spotlight just over two years ago and it's a role he's developed a comfort with in dealing with public and private entities as he has gone about the work of making Lafayette accessible for all of us. He's got a great story! We get to a good bit of it in this interview. The podcast also includes a segment about recent developments in connection with the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority's Coastal Master Plan. It was recorded before St. John the Baptist Parish became the sixth parish to file suit against oil and gas companies for damage they did to wetlands by way of exploration activities in the Coastal Zone of that parish. If oil and gas won't pay, we can't stay in South Louisiana. ••• Thanks to Matt Roberts, AOC's Community Production Manager for help locating the music used in this segment. A Foolish Game by Hans Atom (c) copyright 2017 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license. http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/hansatom/55394 Ft: Snowflake "

Yes, it’s still Halloween night and yes, the seance is still going on. But before we hear how that turns out, why don’t we take a 250 year detour back to an earlier, chillier October evening in Williamsburg? Just for a bit though. Once the stars have aligned and all the owls have hooted their last hoots, it’s back to those crazy kids at the Equator. Will they finally make a supernatural connection with Aaron? Over at the Williamsburg Police Station, Tracy Daggett’s exhausting all-nighter is coming to an eager end. But to her chagrin, just as she’s about to head out the door, she bumps elbows with an old Lafayette High classmate. Someone our long-time listeners might recognize. Oh, and this episode contains a special bonus—not one, but two mysterious bags! This podcast contains swearing Frederick Corney as Professor Jobriath Mark Hutchens as Thomas Jefferson Cal Shuey as Richard Holcombe Pete Lutz as Gideon Blackhard Reid Perkins as Caleb Souter Calvin Glaspie as Ted Breanne Long as Bree Claire Penix as Meghan Marshall Colleen Kennedy as Hexabeth Blackhard Jacob Wilson as Josh Ryder Claudia Swain As Jordan Bales Christa Mouser as Tracy Daggett Debbi Burcham as Tanner Dennis Leonituck Jr. as Perry Michael Turner as Ed Jackson And Timothy Costelloe as Francis Fauquier Produced, directed, written and scored by Phillip Merritt Thank you to Freesound.org for the use of their creative commons sound effects. ©Phillip Merritt, 2017