CSI Records a step closer to opening in Simmesport

Chicago Simmesport International Records Inc. has taken another big step toward beginning operations in the Simmesport Community Complex -- the former Dunbar High/ Simmesport Elementary campus.

Bishop Joe Simon -- a Simmesport native, Grammy Award-winning R&B entertainer in the 1960s-80s and now a full-time Gospel minister with an international ministry -- said his CSI Records is now registered with the Louisiana Secretary of State’s Office as a Louisiana corporation.

Simon said he is looking forward to working with the state, parish and Simmesport community “to do positive things for our children and our community.”

CSI has also added two members to its team “who will work closely with the Simmesport community and the Simmesport Community Youth Choir,” Simon added.

Sonny James Adams will coordinate the formation of the Simmesport Community Youth Choir and work with the group once it’s established. Adams is an experienced R&B musician who played with Simon, Lou Rawls, O.C. Smith, Ike Turner and Johnnie Taylor.

Like Simon, Adams left the world of popular entertainment to pursue a Gospel ministry in music. He is a member of First Baptist Church in Perris, Calif.

“I am grateful to God that he has blessed me and given me this opportunity to join in with the Joe Simon Outreach Ministries to coordinate and work with the Simmesport Community Youth Choir,” Adams said.

Kaye Fullylove is the music media coordinator for CSI records.

She is a former radio disc jockey whose radio career began in 1976 at Dallas’ KKDA FM/AM. In 1978 she moved to San Diego to join the line-up at radio station XHRM-FM 92.5 before leaving the radio business. She returned to radio in 1998 at KKDA, where she worked until 2012.

“I am honored to join in and be affiliated with Minister Joe Simon and the Simmesport community and helping with the coordination and establishing of the Simmesport Community Youth Choir.”  

The youth choir is Simon’s first project in his Outreach Ministry at the Community Center Complex. CSI Records will be operating a commercial radio station, but will also be part of Simon’s work training program. The Youth Choir will be the first group to record in the new studio, Simon said.

The Town of Simmesport has a 99-year-lease with the Avoyelles Parish School Board for the Community Center Complex last year. The monthly lease obligation is being met with in-kind services provided by the town and its partners in providing community services -- including educational, recreational and job training.

The former school was once the all-black Dunbar School. When the public schools desegregated, the school became Simmesport Elementary. When a federal court order consolidated schools in 1988, the high school grades were moved to the consolidated Avoyelles High in Moreauville and Simmesport Elementary was moved into the former high school building, which was renamed Riverside Elementary.

The closed elementary school was used as a parish prison for many years until a reduction in state prisoners forced the Avoyelles Sheriff’s Office to close the prison.