Cafe Reconcile

"Who says God can't provide redemption through fried catfish and collard greens?"

By Patrick Johnson

Listen to this Commentary!

Youth Radio’s Patrick Johnson talked to young people from Cafe Reconcile, a non-profit employment training program located in one of New Orlean's most violent neighborhoods. This organization is holding its own in some of the city’s most competitive industries post Katrina...and helping transform the city's social landscape.

PATRICK
When you walk inside Café Reconcile, you’re greeted by a warm “hey baby!” Soul is the primary ingredient in Café Reconcile’s food and founder Craig Cuccia says it’s been that way from the beginning.

CRAIG (on tape)
I'm a life long New Orleanian and the idea of Café Reconcile was born out of spiritual adventure.

PATRICK
Not an adventure sparked at a business conference...but instead from Cuccia’s time with a Jesuit priest. Who says God can't provide redemption through fried catfish and collard greens?

Café Reconcile is doing just that, with six week training sessions in cooking and restaurant management. The program – based in one of New Orleans most violent neighborhoods, central city – is helping local kids get started in promising careers.

Seventeen-year old Jeffery Vannor, who graduated from the restaurant program, is currently department chef in the Café. He dreams of going to culinary school. Before Jeffrey came here, his cooking skills were limited to making eggs and pancakes.

JEFFERY (on tape)
But now I'm cooking shrimp etouffee and crawfish pasta and smothered okra and collard greens...

PATRICK
The point of the program is to get kids off the street and into the hospitality industry. Head Chef Joron Smith, who calls himself “Chef Joe,” used to be a drug dealer making plenty of money.

CHEF JOE (on tape)
As fast as I was making it, I was blowing it. When I started working here – I started here making at six fifty an hour. I did more with that six fifty an hour than I did with all the money I made standing on the corner!

Now I'm about to be a home owner...

PATRICK
Café Reconcile is helping Chef Joe buy a home, addressing a new problem in the neighborhood since Hurricane Katrina – housing.

In the same spirit as the café, Reconcile started a construction program to meet the changing job market, and to help young residents return to the community.

Craig Cuccia says like the café, construction can also provide solid jobs for local kids.

CRAIG (on tape)
It's the growth industry for the next ten to 15 years. And I'm talking about jobs that will pay 25, 30, 40, 55 thousand dollars if they stay on the path, in two or three years, they can make a real good living.

PATRICK
To get its business plan off the ground, the non-profit bought up some cheap land from the city. It also got some financial support from other partners. Now it’s using the land and materials to teach young workers valuable skills.

The Café is starting small, building homes for minimal profit. Many will go to graduates of Café Reconcile.

Jeffery Vannor will be one of the first homeowners. But how does a 17-year-old afford a house?

JEFFERY (on tape)
Craig, my boss, he said that my house was going to be paid for and I didn't get all the details...

PATRICK
In Jeffery's case, Café Reconcile and its benefactors are setting up a lease purchase plan, where he can build up credit over the next few years and then have the financing switched to his name.

CRAIG (on tape)
It's very important that we keep them in the community. I mean, neighborhoods like this are going to get gentrified, so we need to get working class people on the ground.

PATRICK
Chef Joe says with the restaurant and the construction business, Café Reconcile is helping improve the city in an unconventional way. The program is catching kids before they get too deep into the street life by using a technique that works well with teens – peer pressure. Each success story started by giving one kid a good job.

CRAIG (on tape)
And their friends can see them doing good... Then they friends would start to come, and that took a whole group of them off the corner. That's how we do it, one corner at a time.

PATRICK
And slowly but surely, Café Reconcile is transforming the lives of young people and the neighborhood surrounding them.