JACC History
The Jordan neighborhood is a community representing the widest breadth of lifestyles and demographics in the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area. Bordered on the north by Lowry Avenue and on the east by Emerson Avenue, it has a unique border on the south and west by West Broadway Avenue. Jordan is mainly a residential neighborhood.
The Jordan Area Community Council (JACC) is the nonprofit, citizen participation organization for the Jordan neighborhood. It is one of the city’s first community organizations, JACC began in 1964 when local PTA members came together to prevent closure of the North Branch public library. That struggle, which resulted in a new North Library opening in 1970, firmly established JACC as a grassroots organization based upon the belief that residents could solve problems through collective action.
Jordan gets its name from a neighborhood junior high school, which was built in 1922 and named after Minneapolis Public Schools Superintendent Emeritus Charles Morison Jordan.
In the late eighties, Jordan conducted an exhaustive survey visiting hundreds of residents in their home, the survey revealed that 75% of Jordan residents believed their neighborhood to be in a state of decline with the most often cited problem relating to crime and housing, specifically focusing on drug activity and absentee owner property.
Subsequently, Jordan developed its first neighborhood wide issue campaign, the Dirty Thirty, which mobilized and strengthened Jordan block clubs, including 250 residents, the mayor, city council and city inspections department in a strategic action plan to clean up and/or remove the 30 most blighted and problem absentee owned properties throughout the neighborhood.
Over the years, JACC has collaborated with many other neighborhood stakeholders to meet its mission. JACC currently participates in Northside Neighborhood Council (NNC) monthly meetings to collaborate with other Northside associations and the Neighborhood Community Relations (NCR) department to address similar community issues, concerns, provide updates and announcements, and brainstorm strategies for community engagement.
The Jordan Area Community Council (JACC) has had a history of involving the community by doing outreach, especially thru door knocking, social gatherings and building block clubs for residents to get to know their neighbors. JACC will continue to focus on the priorities of residents.
All meetings are open to the public, ADA accessible and every agenda allocates time for Community input.