Kim Braud, photographed at the former Bishop Perry Center in the in Faubourg Marigny of New Orleans, Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025. Braud is protesting the sale of the Bishop Perry Center by the Archdiocese to a local developer. She is on a mission to honor the free woman of color, Marie Couvent, who owned it 150 years ago and always intended for it to be a school that served needy children. (Staff photo by Scott Threlkeld, The Times-Picayune)
1941 Dauphine St.
Kim Braud, photographed at the former Bishop Perry Center in the in Faubourg Marigny of New Orleans, Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025. Braud is protesting the sale of the Bishop Perry Center by the Archdiocese to a local developer. She is on a mission to honor the free woman of color, Marie Couvent, who owned it 150 years ago and always intended for it to be a school that served needy children. (Staff photo by Scott Threlkeld, The Times-Picayune)
1941 Dauphine St.
Kim Braud suspected she was too late to stop the Archdiocese of New Orleans from selling her former elementary school in the Faubourg Marigny, which she knew in the 1970s as Holy Redeemer, to a local developer.
The historic building at 1941 Dauphine Street was one of several properties that the local Roman Catholic church recently received court approval to sell to help fund a settlement with hundreds of survivors of clergy sex abuse in its long-running bankruptcy case.
Braud, 58, had hoped to reach her own deal with the archdiocese to take over the building, most recently known as the Bishop Perry Center, and turn it into a co-working space and community development center that would honor the legacy of its original 19th century owner, a free woman of color named Marie Couvent.
On Dec. 23, Braud asked the bankruptcy court to let her intervene in the case and block the sale. Later that day, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Grabill set a hearing on the matter for mid-January. Attorneys for the church subsequently filed court documents saying the building had already sold.
Braud is not angry. She is disappointed, however, and after a career that has taken her around the world and included stints as a model, air traffic controller, entrepreneur and founder of a nonprofit that helps Black business owners, she is not prone to giving up.
So, even though she knows it’s too late to undo the sale, which was finalized Dec. 20, Braud plans to keep her upcoming court date so she can publicly tell the Catholic community and anyone else who will listen why Marie Couvent matters and how she hopes to keep her memory alive.
“I am going to be the town crier for Marie Couvent,” said Braud, who splits her time between Atlanta and New Orleans. “There are so many Black children who benefitted from the schools that have operated on that site. Her vision has been all but erased. I don’t want it to be forgotten.”
To be clear, part of the reason Couvent’s legacy has waned is because Couvent, once an enslaved person who came to New Orleans in the 1790s, owned slaves herself after she gained her freedom.
It’s a stain on her record that Braud, whose ancestors include enslaved persons, is not trying to overlook.
“I get it,” Braud said. “But Marie Couvent’s story is about more than owning slaves. It’s about all the good that has come from her.”
Marie Justine Cirnaire Couvent was born in Africa in 1757 and shipped as a child to St. Domingue in the West Indies. She resettled in New Orleans in the 1790s, and by 1806 had secured her freedom and bought two pieces of land in the city, including the Dauphine Street property, records show.
She died in 1837, leaving the Dauphine Street property in her will for “the establishment of a free school for orphans of color,” stipulating that “the lands and buildings are never (to be) sold under any pretext whatever,” according to media reports.
The executor of her will turned over the building to the local Catholic church, which continued to honor her wishes for much of the next two centuries. Among the building’s uses were the Catholic Institution for Indigent Orphans, Holy Redeemer Elementary School, Bishop Perry Middle School and St. Gerard Majella Alternative School.
Most recently, it was used as the Bishop Perry Center, which provided services to homeless families before closing permanently in 2017.
Braud didn’t know about Couvent when she was a student at Holy Redeemer in the 1970s. She remembers the school, which counts the city’s first Black mayor, Ernest “Dutch” Morial, among its graduates, as a warm, happy place run by an order of “Old School” nuns, who were strict but loving.
“They were like second parents to us,” said Braud, who lived in the Lower Ninth Ward. “I cannot even begin to describe the sense of family and community we had.”
The students were all Black. Most of the nuns were white. Sr. Hillary taught first grade and was adored by the kids. Sr. Carmelita was the principal, “rigid but fair.” Mrs. Porter was the cafeteria lady who gave out extra chicken on chicken day.
“The school had a great reputation, which is why we all went there, even though we lived on the other side of the canal,” said Braud, whose mom was a recruiter at Touro Infirmary and dad worked at Kaiser Aluminum. “It was a known thing in the community.”
Looking back on it all, Braud realizes she was fortunate and recognizes her family had a lot do with it. But she also credits her early school years for instilling in her the discipline and love of learning that enabled her to start businesses, and a nonprofit that helps minority business owners in the manufacturing and logistics sectors, in Atlanta.
“Great people came out of that school,” she said. “I don’t want that to be forgotten.”
While the building housed Catholic schools and institutions that were run by the Catholic church, the archdiocese didn’t own the building until 2019, when it went to court and successfully got clear title to the property. At the time, archdiocese spokesperson Sarah McDonald said there were no specific plans to sell the building.
Under Louisiana law, a person or entity must have been in possession of a property for 30 years for it to be considered theirs without a title from the previous owner.
A year later, the church filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy amid mounting claims of clergy sex abuse. It has since sold about $15 million worth of surplus properties, including 1941 Dauphine St., as it works toward a settlement with more than 550 abuse survivors.
“I get that legally they have the right to sell the property,” Braud said. “But morally it doesn’t seem right. Couvent wanted this property to be used for educational purposes.”
Braud found out about the sale of the building on a visit home to see her mom last September. She quickly put together a 100-page proposal, offering to lease the building and convert it to a co-working space and community center focused on workforce development. Her plan was to use the rent from the co-working tenants to eventually purchase the building from the archdiocese for $1.9 million and house nonprofits there.
By the time she floated her proposal to archdiocese real estate broker Parke McEnery, however, he was deep in negotiations with another buyer, court documents show.
“He was very gracious but explained it was too late,” she said.
That buyer, Harahan investor Daniel McKearan, went on to sign a purchase agreement for the building for $1.1 million. Braud did not submit a formal backup offer.
On Dec. 19, the court cleared the way for McKearan to purchase the building. The sale was finalized a day later. Braud, unaware that the sale had closed, filed to block the sale Dec. 23.
“I know it’s too late, but I want to people to know about this woman and what she wanted for this building,” she said.
In a statement shortly before Christmas, the archdiocese’s McDonald said “Putting a property back into commerce for the good of the community as we generate revenue to put towards a settlement is a positive step forward.”
Braud said she hopes to meet with McKearan and will ask him to put a historical marker honoring Couvent on the building or its grounds.
McKearan did not respond to requests for comment.
Braud also plans to start a scholarship fund in Couvent’s name to benefit local Black students.
“Her vision was to provide an education for free children of color and black orphans,’ Braud said. “I specifically want to honor that legacy.”
Email Stephanie Riegel at stephanie.riegel@theadvocate.com.
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