ROUSES_SeptOct2019_Magazine

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like father, like sonny by SARAH BAIRD

After graduating from St. Augustine High School and the Univer- sity of New Orleans, Lee worked for the New Orleans Zephyrs and, eventually, as chief aide to the late owner of the New Orleans Saints, Tom Benson. “My experiences traveling with him, it was everything you can imagine: first class, private jets, yachts — everything. It was Mr. and Mrs. Benson and me, 12 to 16 hours a day. When we would travel it would be for months at a time if we were going somewhere. I was trusted. I really learned a lot through just people-watching more than anything, but obviously communicating, too — interacting with people.” Eventually, though, a story in the newspaper inspired him to take a gigantic leap of faith. “I saw [in the newspaper] that there had been a murder: One boy murdered another boy. And the thing that boy and I had in common is that we didn’t have our fathers. So, I said, ‘How can I give back? What was the difference between his life and my life?’ Obviously, the trauma of my dad dying in front of me could have steered me the wrong way, but my family kept me on the right track. I thought, ‘Well, why don’t I just give everything my mom gave to me, to others? Why don’t I just create that for boys on the preven- tive side?’” Son of a Saint selects a group of boys ages 10-13 to join the program every year, with each Son of a Saint mentee official remaining in the program until he is 18. “A lot of people focus on kids after they commit crimes and after they do bad things. I was like, well, if [we focused on them] before — when they’re 10 or so, before they get in the system — we could prevent that. It makes sense,” he says. “And for the results that we wanted to have, our program had to be long-term. It had to be very intentional. Really, once they’re in [Son of a Saint] at 10, it’s like a family, so you never really leave the family.” Lee found his first group of Son of a Saint mentees through coaches and school connections, and quickly immersed himself in doing everything in his power to better their lives. “We just started plugging away on activities with the boys. I was pretty much doing

When family-related tragedy, like the unexpected death of a parent, strikes a child at a young age, the road to a healthy, happy adolescence and future adult success becomes that much more difficult to navigate — mentally, emotionally and beyond. F or Son of a Saint founder Bivian “Sonny” Lee III, those struggles hit close to home. Lee’s father, Bivian Lee, Jr., was an NFL defensive back for the New Orleans Saints in the early 1970s who died tragi- cally from an enlarged heart at age 36. “I grew up in New Orleans East. My father passed when I was three years old. He died in front of me — he took his last breath in front of me. It’s impactful for me just remembering that. Also, I grew up with a lot of women in my family, but not many males at all.” The lasting influence of his father’s death at such a young age eventually led Lee to dedicate his life to young men in similar situa- tions. In 2011, he founded Son of a Saint: a mentorship, emotional support and life skills program for young boys in New Orleans who are fatherless due to death, abandonment or incarceration. It’s often said that the best kinds of leaders and positive role models have a personal connection to, and deep understanding of, the communities and issues they’re trying to tackle. There is, perhaps, no better example of this than Lee. “Growing up, I had a very loving environment. But I didn’t go fishing. I didn’t know what the tools were at Home Depot, so I didn’t build things. I didn’t do some of those guy things. Even when it came to my confidence; there was a lack of confidence, I think, on my part. I also had some challenges in middle school navigating anger.”

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SEPTEMBER•OCTOBER 2019

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