Boys Girls and Arts

We’ve talked a lot on this show about how businesses have adapted
to the challenges created by the pandemic. But for nonprofit
organizations, which sort of live in a constant state of
responding to challenges - closing gaps and providing services to
the community in any number of ways – the pandemic and
post-pandemic has created its own set of obstacles and
opportunities for growth and reinvention.


Renee Chatelain is President of the Arts Council of Greater Baton
Rouge, a nearly 50-year-old nonprofit that promotes cultural
growth, economic development, and educational enhancement through
the arts in and around the 11-parish Capital Region that it
serves. As the Arts Council of the Capital City, the
organization is a hub for information and resources benefiting
organizations and residents statewide.


Renee has been at the helm of the organization since 2015 and in
that time has helped grow the Arts Council and lead it through
its recent expansion and relocation. The new center opened in the
fall of 2021, just as the community was emerging from the fourth
surge of the Covid crisis, a time when many arts organizations
were grappling with very real challenges to their sustainability.
Thanks to the leadership and stewardship of Renee, Baton Rouge
didn’t lose any organizations to Covid.


Chelsey Laborde Blankenship is a longtime board member of the
Boys and Girls Club of Metro Louisiana, an organization that,
like the Arts Council is providing an invaluable service to the
community. Actually, make that nine communities!


In April 2021, the Boys and Girls Club of Southeast Louisiana and
the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Baton Rouge merged to become
the Boys and Girls Club of Metro Louisiana in order to better
serve some 20-thousand families in nine southeast Louisiana
parishes. The organization provides out of school programs for
boys and girls, including dynamic opportunities to promote the
healthy lifestyles and academic success of its members.


Chelsea spent four years at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater
Baton Rouge as its resource development and marketing associate
before branching out and creating her own communications and
marketing firm, CLB Consulting. 


Out to Lunch Baton Rouge is recorded over lunch at Mansurs on the
Boulevard. You can see photos from this show by Erik Otts at our
website. And check out more recent conversation about Baton Rouge
arts and sciences with artist Rob Carpenter and PC OG Tim Rauls.


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