![]() The asset mapping revealed sentiments held by residents that JMMF staff had been unaware of. Photo courtesy of the Jackson Medical Mall Foundation Children learn choreography at a dance class offered by Jackson Medical Mall. While there were considerable arts and cultural activities in the city overall, they were mostly concentrated in an area that was generally considered a budding arts district. This process revealed that there were geographic disparities in the distribution of arts and culture opportunities. The mapping activities asked residents to name and plot arts and cultural amenities on a map. Many residents also said there needed to be more ways to find out about arts and cultural events, such as newsletters. However, participants also noted that churches and schools often serve their own membership and not necessarily the wider community for various reasons, such as budgetary restraints and security concerns. Overall, focus group participants said they valued arts and cultural activities, and identified schools and churches as key places where these activities can be introduced, developed, and nurtured. To encourage participation, JMMF provided participants with a $25 gift card. ![]() MURC also facilitated focus groups for local youth, neighborhood associations, and older adults living in the surrounding community. Surveys were distributed via mail and electronically to business associations, community groups, homeowners, and neighborhood organizations in the surrounding area. JMMF hired the Mississippi Urban Research Center (MURC) to provide technical support, design a questionnaire, conduct canvassing activities, and analyze results. The organization assembled an arts advisory committee, composed of local artists and residents, to spearhead the process using surveys, focus groups, and neighborhood mapping activities. In order to know what the community lacked, JMMF inventoried the talent and resources it already had, via a process called cultural asset-mapping, which took place from the fall of 2016 into the spring of 2017. In 2015, JMMF received a $3 million grant from ArtPlace America’s Community Development Investments program to investigate and support place-based community development organizations to sustainably incorporate arts and culture into the organization’s core work. Since then, the complex has evolved from purely a medical facility to a large complex that leases space to health care, retail, and social service–providing tenants. Aaron Shirley launched the Jackson Medical Mall Foundation (JMMF) as the management arm of the facility, with the dual mission of fostering a holistic approach to health care to underserved populations and promoting community and economic development to surrounding areas, which include the historic Georgetown, Virden Addition, Shady Oaks, and Mid-Town neighborhoods. Today, the complex-now called the Jackson Medical Mall Thad Cochran Center-is a community pillar, serving as a health resource for thousands of people each year, but also as a meeting place and major player in community development. Once holding the distinction as the first and largest shopping mall in the city, the property sat nearly empty for years before it was repurposed into a bustling community health center in the same way that an artist transforms old materials into a new sculpture. ![]() The transformation of an abandoned, 900,000-square-foot complex in Jackson, Mississippi, could be compared to a work of art. Two women make conversation at one of the many events hosted at the Jackson Medical Mall.
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