ABiz celebrates another class of Acadiana's most influential female trailblazers, the Lourdes Foundation honors a local philanthropist and MedExpress in Opelousas celebrates its 22nd year as the "little ambulance service that could."
Featured each year in the September/October issue of ABiz, they are the best, brightest and most influential of Acadiana's women. Since 1999, the Women Who Mean Business Awards have been presented to women of distinction throughout the area, recognizing them for their entrepreneurship, professionalism, civic involvement and community leadership. This year's group, as is tradition, gathered Oct. 2 at River Oaks Catering & Event Center among 375 of their peers, family members and friends thanks in large part to presenting sponsors IberiaBank and LHC Group.
1. (front row) Patsy Randall, Sherry Broussard, Ann Dobie and Melissa Bonin; (back row) Buffy Domingue, Maren Rosen, Marie Desormeaux Centanni, Lorna Bourg, Sarah Berthelot, Stephanie Bennett and Marcelle Fontenot
2. Supporting sponsor Paul Michael Company
3. Mary Washington, Pat Colbert-Cormier and Barbara McCarty
4. Sara Zuschlag and Angela Cole
5. Alison Alleman, Tracy Ralston and Julie Broussard
6. Angie Begnaud
7. Sarah Berthelot
8. Melissa Bonin
9. Lorna Bourg
10. Patsy Randall
11. Maren Rosen
12. Stephanie Bennett
13. Marie Centanni
14. Marcelle Fontenot
15. Buffy Domingue
16. Sherry Broussard
17. Ann Dobie
18. Lauren Baker, Maren Rosen, Paul Baker, Ann Dobie, Sarah Bertholet and Walter Dobie
19. (front row) Candace Breaux, Eloony Cavalier and Dwazendra Smith; (back row) Dana Phillips, Patsy Randall, Denita Derousselle and Winford Amos
In late September Lourdes Foundation held a special birthday party and donor recognition reception for community philanthropist Jim Moncus. The party honored Moncus's $1 million gift to the foundation to support health care outreach programs to help those most in need (this personal donation is the largest donation received by the Lourdes Foundation to date.) The four-story, 104,000-square-foot medical office building on the Lourdes campus was blessed and renamed the James Devin Moncus Medical Building. Jim and his wife Ruth celebrated the donation and his 75th birthday with friends, family and longtime business associates.
1. Charles Bondy, Jim Moncus and Ed Lamb
2. Gerald Boudreaux, Drs. Ginger and Kemp Coreil, and Bud Barrow
3. Tracey and Dr. Tory Gunderson
4. Joe Giglio, Jeigh Stipe and Gerald Boudreaux
5. Jim and Ruth Moncus (with his gift of an artistic rendering of the newly named Moncus Medical Building)
6. Sister Helen Cahill, Jim Prince and Sister Martha Ann Abshire
7. Bryan and Michelle Hanks, Ruth and Jim Moncus, and Bud Barrow
8. Charles Bondy, Jim Moncus, Nancy Bondy, Ruth Moncus and Ed Lamb
More than 350 well-wishers stopped by MedExpress Ambulance Service's Opelousas office to help the company celebrate 22 years in business. The "little ambulance service that could" has put much of its effort into expanding EMS into rural communities, having added substations in Port Barre, Washington, Pollock and Zwolle. More recently, MedExpress expanded its industrial medical staffing for governmental agencies and contractors in Louisiana and other states.
1. Opelousas Police Chief Perry Gallow and Mark Majors
2. Connie Shakesnider and Ashley Coker
3. Nathaniel Majors and Mark Majors
4. Nathaniel Majors, Mark Majors and the Rev. Samuel Hamm
5. Mike Thibodeaux, Merlene Sweet Pickney, Mary Kinnerson, Mark Majors, Donanguelle Richard and Santoria Jason