Location
Age
Area of FocusAbout Lorna's Work
Lorna Bourg is the co-founder, president, and executive director of the Southern Mutual Help Association, an advocacy and self-help organization working with the rural poor in Louisiana.
The Association is credited with publicizing the problems of sugar cane workers in that area and bringing an end to their exploitation. It established the first medical and dental clinics for local farm workers, an adult literacy program, an oral history program, and scholarship funds for youth. Among the Association’s innovative programs, Bourg founded the Louisiana Rural Home Loan Partnership, which includes an eight-bank consortium that has made possible new home ownership for hundreds of rural Louisiana families.
Using a comprehensive self-development and partnership approach, Bourg concentrates on rebuilding whole communities devastated by transitioning economies, working to insure social and economic justice for the poorest and most marginalized families in rural Louisiana. At the national level, she serves as co-founder and president of Sustained Excellence Alliance, Inc., a practitioner-led, nonprofit organization of ten community development corporations, collectively doing 100 million dollars’ worth of low-income community development each year.
Biography
Bourg received a B.S. (1965) and an M.S. (1975) from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She is a graduate of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government Program for senior executives.
Last updated January 1, 2005
Published on July 1, 1992
