Donna Fraiche is a shareholder and member of the health care and public policy departments in the New Orleans office of the law firm Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz and chairs its Women’s Initiative. She was past managing partner and past chair of the health law practice group of Locke, Liddell & Sapp’s New Orleans office. She serves as the Honorary Consul-General of Japan at New Orleans and currently chairs the Louisiana Health Care Commission. She received her J.D. from Loyola University New Orleans College of Law in 1975 and is a past chair of the Board of Trustees, past president of the Alumni Association and serves as a member of the College of Law Visiting Committee. Donna received the 2006 Integritas Vitae award and delivered the College of Law’s 2001 commencement address.
She is president of Louisiana Appleseed, a pro-bono effort to advance social justice. She is president of the Louisiana Supreme Court Historic Society and past president of the Louisiana Bar Foundation and the first woman president of the American Health Lawyers Association. After Hurricane Katrina, she was appointed to the board of the Louisiana Recovery Authority as chair of the Long Range Community Planning Committee. Thereafter she served as a vice president of LA Speaks and is now on the boards of CPEX, New Orleans Opera Association, LSU Museum, and on the City of New Orleans Tax Fairness Commission. Fraiche was the 2002 recipient of the New Orleans Regional Chamber of Commerce’s highest honor, the Joseph W. Simon, Jr., Memorial Award. In 2003, the World Trade Center of New Orleans conferred upon her the prestigious Order of the Mark. In 2004, she received the President’s Award from the New Orleans Bar Association. Donna was named a 2007 Junior Achievement Business Hall of Fame Laureate.
She and her husband, Dr. John Fraiche, funded the Fraiche Distinguished Law Professorship and the Fraiche Professorship in Public Policy and are members of the Loyola Society of St. Ignatius. She and John, a board-certified family practitioner, have a daughter, a son, and two grandsons.