In April, downtown Shreveport’s highest-profile rehab in recent memory – the Lofts at 624 – began welcoming apartment dwellers. The moves come none too soon for people who see the development as an important step forward in the revitalization of Shreveport’s historic downtown.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, men are twice as likely to binge drink than women, and they consistently have higher rates of alcoholrelated deaths and hospitalizations than women. Male drivers involved in fatal car accidents are twice as likely to have been intoxicated.