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Category: Top Story

This category showcases the lead coverage readers need to know, offering context, clarity, and insight into issues shaping New Orleans and beyond.

Judge extends safeguards for Angola’s Farm Line for 90 more days

Order requires that officials monitor temperatures every 30 minutes. If heat index hits 88, Farm Line workers get regular breaks, ice, water, and shade.
by Bernard Smith June 24, 2025 Updated June 25, 2025

‘Sometimes we forget our own majesty’ — capturing the cadence of New Orleans on Juneteenth

On Juneteenth this year, one elder spoke of freedom still being unfinished.  A young teacher reflected on what it means to shape free minds in a system that often feels bound. A mother talked about raising Black sons with love and fear in equal measure. 
by Lens staff June 22, 2025 Updated June 27, 2025
A towering, austere view of the House of Detention in New Orleans, set against a dramatic, swirling sky.

The towering legacy of the House of Detention

“This building’s architecture tells one story. But its human history tells another— and we need to confront both,” said Loyola Law School professor Andrea Armstrong
by Bernard Smith June 20, 2025 Updated June 25, 2025

Louisiana’s new bill would codify gas as “green energy”

A bill on its way to the Governor’s desk—with connections to gas industry allies—could enshrine hydrocarbons as Louisiana’s future.
by Emily Sanders, ExxonKnews, and Delaney Dryfoos, The Lens June 18, 2025 Updated June 24, 2025

Dan Bright was my brother. Death Row didn’t kill us, but it tried. 

We can’t keep losing our brothers to the aftermath of injustice. We can’t call it “freedom” if we’re still dying from what they did to us.
by Shareef Cousin June 15, 2025 Updated June 25, 2025

‘No Kings Day’ draws 6,500 into New Orleans streets

Protesters carried handmade signs, chanted slogans, voiced concerns about mounting threats to democracy and billionaire-first politics, and — because it’s New Orleans — they blew bubbles. 
by Gus Bennett June 14, 2025 Updated June 25, 2025

Will Ascension Parish become Ammonia Parish?

Three new proposed chemical plants could more than quadruple ammonia production in the Donaldsonville area, leaving Ascension residents to face more toxic air pollution and possible chemical disasters, according to a new report from Rural Roots and the Louisiana Bucket Brigade.
by Delaney Dryfoos June 13, 2025 Updated June 13, 2025

Air pollution messes up pregnant women’s metabolism, spurs preterm births

Tiny air pollutants appear to cause molecular changes in expectant mothers' blood that can impact fetal development and cause stress in the mother, which could be behind early labor and health problems for babies.
by Brian Bienkowski, The New Lede June 11, 2025 Updated June 11, 2025

Her hips uncover the truth about America’s music history

Dancer Chipo Kandake along with New Orleans drumming legend Herlin Riley present a show on Saturday that tells the story of what we call American music, which, she says, started with the Black community.
by Mizani Ball June 6, 2025 Updated June 11, 2025

K-3 reading improves as Louisiana continues early-literacy focus

Armed by scientific studies, reading experts urged a resurgence of phonics, which helps children learn to read by sounding-out words, in a way well-known to older generations. But the state's third graders are still struggling from their Zoom-heavy start to reading.
by Marta Jewson June 4, 2025 Updated June 4, 2025

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