Waynette Ballengee is the area's best-known fundraiser and event organizer.

Waynette Ballengee brings people together

Each issue, 318 Forum’s Tony Taglavore takes to lunch a local person — someone who is well-known, successful, and/or influential, and asks, “What’s Your Story?”

I cried off all my makeup. All the false eyelashes were now on my cheeks rather than on my eyes.” Christmas in the Sky, 2010. Every two years, one of Shreveport-Bossier’s biggest social events and fundraisers. Black tie. Ballroom gowns. Big-money donors. A who’s who of the see-and-be-seen crowd.

“The live auction is the showpiece.” Ah, yes. Big-ticket items sold to the highest bidder.

“Somehow, we lost a piece of jewelry.” Gulp. “Thousands of people are coming in.

We don’t know what we are going to do. It’s the first item in the live auction. ‘Frantic’ is not the right word.”

A high school volunteer promised to find the missing silver medallion with red stones. How? He got on his hands and knees and crawled the floors of Louisiana Downs underneath all the auction tables.

“What are the chances of somebody really finding that item?” Better than she thought. “He runs into where I was getting dressed. He’s screaming. He’s holding up the item. ‘I found it! It’s OK!’” Cue the waterworks one more time. “That started the whole tear thing all over again. I think we did my makeup three times that night before we finally got the eyelashes glued back on. I walked into the live auction like it’s all good. Nobody ever knew we lost the item.”

Waynette Ballengee, perhaps our area’s best-known fundraiser and event organizer, as well as a philanthropist, told me that story, and her story, over lunch at a place she chose, Fairfield Market & Grocery. Waynette had her “usual” marinated shrimp salad, potato chips and sweet tea. I had the Southwest chicken salad and water with lemon.

“I bought the item,” Waynette said of the once-missing medallion. “I still own it, because it was such a traumatic experience of losing it, I had to bring it home with me.”

Waynette’s talents have brought home what she figures to be millions of dollars for the estimated hundreds of organizations she has chaired. In addition to leading Christmas in the Sky (Shreveport Regional Arts Council) for 14 years, Waynette has had a hand in raising money for the likes of Gingerbread House, the LSU Health Sciences Foundation (“An Evening for Healers”) and The American Heart Association (“Go Red for Women”).

“I was seen as the person who was really good at planning a party. That’s never what I set out to be known for, but that’s what happened because of my involvement with some very visible things.”

The glitz and glamor of galas are a long way from the rural streets of Cotton Valley, where Waynette grew up. She was an only child, but never alone, as her grandmother and aunt lived with Waynette and her parents.

“My grandmother really took care of me every day because my mom was at work. We went around to all the stores in town. We made the rounds. We went to the grocery store. We went to the dress shop. We visited everybody who had a store in Cotton Valley. It was just a great, fun childhood.”

During that time, Waynette learned the importance of giving. That lesson was taught year-round but emphasized each Christmas Eve.

“After our family dinner — it would be late, almost time to go to bed — my mother and grandmother would package up all this food and wrap it up and put it in something we could carry. My dad would have had my mother go out and buy clothes or toys. My daddy and I would get in his truck. We would go down the darkest country road with no lights. I would have no idea where we were going. Sometimes we couldn’t get all the way to these houses. We would park the truck and walk in with whatever we had. It was like Santa Claus really did come. I just remember that is what was expected of people. It wasn’t that we were the richest people in town. It was just that my daddy and my mother had the heart for making things better.”

Despite teaching school — mostly fourth grade — for 53 years, Waynette’s mom discouraged her daughter from a career in education. Waynette’s favorite sport was — and is — football (she’s a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan). So much so that Waynette wanted to attend the University of Alabama (because that’s where the legendary Paul “Bear” Bryant coached) and become a sports reporter. But Mom said Louisiana Tech was far enough away from home.

Knowing she wasn’t proficient in math or science, Waynette chose to major in psychology.

“It was by default. I liked the idea of what psychology classes were about, learning about behavior and personalities. I loved my curriculum. I excelled as a psychology student, but then you had that degree — summa cum laude — and there weren’t any jobs.”

Waynette earned two degrees but never worked as a psychologist. She tried her hand as a personnel director, a human resources director, in marketing, outside sales and as a school admissions director. (“I loved that job most of all.”)

But after marriage (she’s been divorced 17 years) and giving birth to two children (both daughters), Waynette “didn’t have to go to work anymore.” But she had to do something.

“I knew from a very early age that if I didn’t go to work every day, I had to have something to do that mattered to me. I’m not that person who can just stay home. I don’t cook at all. How many times can you clean your house? You can’t shop constantly. That becomes non-fulfilling. I like tennis. I like pickleball. I can’t do that all the time.”

So, Waynette began occupying her time volunteering. Waynette’s first big event was chairperson of the Eden Gardens Elementary School carnival.

“I got so much joy out of bringing all kinds of people together.”

Twenty-one years later, she still gets joy.

“I’ve learned about myself along the way that I really have to believe in the cause in order to throw myself into it and give it the very best effort I have. People might not like working with me because I expect a lot, and if you tell me you’re going to be on my team, I expect you to do whatever job it is you signed on for. I really don’t like excuses. If I expect you to show up, I expect you to give me all you have, because that’s what I’m going to give you.”

Waynette, now in her mid-60s, walked away from chairing Christmas in the Sky in 2018 (“I knew it was time”). That meant her calendar was open even more, and three years ago, Waynette began volunteering in a completely different way.

“I decided being a substitute (teacher) in Caddo Parish Schools would give me this view of where we really are as a city. What do we really look like? How racially divided are we? How socioeconomically divided are we? And boy, have I gotten a life lesson. Substituting has changed my world. It is my most passionate project. I am sorry I didn’t do it sooner.”

Thinking Waynette’s time would be better spent visiting with a potential big donor for a meaningful organization than talking with a nickel-and-dime guy like me, I decided to ask my final question. As always, what is it about her life story that someone could learn from?

“I think everybody can examine their own situation, and if they discover they have some time to give, go give it somewhere to make something better. If everyone we know did what they could, whatever that is, to make something better, then they’ve lived a life that was worth living. I didn’t have the biggest career. I probably never really accomplished anything amazing. But I have made a lot of things better. I think if everybody tried to do that, we would change not only Shreveport. We would change the world.”