Aaronne Simmons runs NOLA Service Circle, an auto-shop mentorship program for young people. His sons' bodies were found in Lake Pontchartrain in 2011.
The boys went missing in 2011 around Easter while walking dogs. Their bodies were later found in the lake.
Simmons runs NOLA Service Circle, an auto-shop mentorship program for young people.
From a Break-In to a Mentorship
The idea for the program grew out of an unlikely source: a burglary. Simmons operated Forever Lounge in the Lower Ninth Ward, and when thieves stole a laptop and other items from the business, he discovered the culprits were local children. Rather than pursue charges, he decided to teach them car repair instead, a restorative approach detailed by The Acadiana Advocate.
That instinct built on years of hands-on experience. Simmons learned routine car repairs from a mechanic and, starting around 2021, began selling worn-out cars for scrap metal while renting an empty lot in New Orleans East for vehicle work, repairing and reselling fixable cars cheaply to people in need. That background became the foundation for the formal training curriculum he now runs out of Central City.
Certifications Turning Into Real Jobs
The results are already tangible. NOLA Service Circle has secured mechanic certifications for nine young men in under a year, and six participants have landed jobs at Take 5 Oil Change, Firestone, and Walmart Auto Centers, per the same NOLA.com account.
One of them is Elijah “Eman” Carter, who joined during the program's first wave of students over the summer and is now a 19-year-old freshman at Southern University studying electrical engineering. Carter still offers oil changes and other car-maintenance services to fellow students for extra money, and he plans to open his own auto shop one day. He described the program as a positive, welcoming brotherhood, a sentiment that captures what Simmons set out to build.
Other teens are still working through the curriculum at the shop. Juel Hatch Jr., an Eleanor McMain Secondary School student, is among the teens training there. Fifteen-year-old Tali Vernon, a Walter Cohen High School student, worked alongside Hatch on replacing a car strut — one of the toughest jobs they've tackled. Also training at the shop are Amyn Scott, a 17-year-old at New Orleans Charter Science and Mathematics High School, and 13-year-old Carter Wilhike, among the program's younger participants.
A Site Still Scarred by Segregation and Loss
Lincoln Beach itself carries a heavier history than the tragedy that unfolded there in 2011. The site has a history shaped by segregation. It closed in 1964.
The $24.5 million restoration effort includes a first phase, and the site could reopen as soon as late 2027, as WWL-TV reported. Security patrols have blocked access in recent years because of safety concerns. Hoodline previously covered the redevelopment plan for the long-shuttered site where Simmons's sons died.
Filling a Workforce Gap Beyond New Orleans
Simmons's grassroots effort also lands at a moment of acute national need for certified mechanics. TechForce Foundation's 2026 industry analysis found annual demand for 70,865 new automotive service technicians nationwide from 2025 to 2029, with roughly 29 percent of those positions — more than 20,000 a year — going unfilled due to a shortage of postsecondary graduates, according to APEX Tech Nation. Automotive program completions did grow 10.9 percent in the 2023-2024 school year to 41,726 graduates nationwide, but the gap persists.
Locally, the numbers suggest real earning potential for program graduates. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the New Orleans-Metairie metro area employed 2,010 automotive service technicians and mechanics as of May 2023, earning a mean hourly wage of $24.21 and an average annual salary of $50,360. Louisiana has roughly 8,620 active automotive service technicians statewide, with the National Institute for Automotive Service Excellence setting key professional benchmarks — including entry-level G1 Maintenance and Light Repair certification and the A1 through A8 light vehicle credentials — that can help graduates like Simmons's students advance in professional shops, per US Mechanic.
Other Skills Training in New Orleans
The New Orleans Career Center has trainees pursuing skilled-trades certifications.
The city has even tested direct cash support for so-called opportunity youth — 16-to-24-year-olds disconnected from work and school — through the New Orleans Guaranteed Income Program, which offered $350 monthly stipends to 125 local young adults. Unlike those municipal programs, Simmons has largely funded NOLA Service Circle himself, covering shop expenses out of pocket while he waits for outside donations or a grant to materialize. It's a model built less on budget lines than on the memory of two boys who never got the chance to grow up — and the father determined to make sure other Central City teens do.
