J.J. Johnson-JioDucci learned her most important life lessons growing up in Avondale.

        “It was a blast,” she said, “It was during the time when everybody took care of everybody. You didn't lock your doors. . . . You just did things for one another.”

        “To me, it's a gift to care and have compassion for other people. Because people cared about me,” she said. “For me to care about the people of Madisonville, I can't even call it second nature. It's just there.”

        She discovered Madisonville in 1987, “by mistake,” she jokes. “All my life I heard . . . it was a rough place that used to be nice.”

        One day a real estate agent drove her to a quiet residential street.

        “There were these little kids, toddlers, playing on their tricycles, little black kids, little white kids. I said, "This is what I'm looking for.' . . . We pulled up at a house that had been renovated, I said, "This is the type of house I would love to have.' ”

        Then the agent said, “J., you're in Madisonville.”

        Ms. JioDucci quickly became involved with the business association and community council, relationships she found particularly fruitful when she became assistant vice president for community reinvestment with Key Bank.

        A violent incident led to her proudest achievement, Students Concerned About Today & Tomorrow (SCATT).

        Students in the Junior Achievement class she was teaching were shaken by the fatal shooting of a drug dealer. “They were upset. They said, "People think all we do is deal drugs.' One youngster said, "We want to do more than play basketball, we want to do something for the community.' ”

        She gave the class $25, which they used for a candy sale that raised $600. The money went to a local food bank. The kids went on to more projects — food drives, dances, beautifying a park, and an annual “Bridging the Gap” dinner with senior citizens.

        She proudly ticks off the list of former SCATT members now in college or raising families.

        Two SCATT graduates showed up on Feb. 28 for a groundbreaking on a new house that represents the organization's recent focus: helping Madisonville youth pay for college.

        SCATT has distributed $30,000 in aid since 1995. The aim is to build an endowment that will expand its reach every year. To that end, Ms. JioDucci recruited donors to provide land, labor and materials for a house that will be sold to benefit the scholarship fund.

        “So far, I've got 20 companies donating or providing at-cost items for the house,” she said.

        Better yet, the owner of a block of vacant land donated the entire package for more houses, also earmarked to provide scholarships.

        “My prayer is that this time next year we'll have another portion of the scholarship that will go to 21- to 30-year-olds for technical school,” she said.

        “She has inspired many of us to get involved and make a difference,” wrote SCATT trustee Sandi Allen-Chenault in nominating Ms. JioDucci for Woman of the Year honors. “Thanks to J.J.'s love for Madisonville and the children, our neighborhood is no longer considered "written off.' Madisonville is growing again.”

        Ms. JioDucci pursues her passion for her community with so much energy that it is easy to forget she is living with osteoarthritis.

        She was 9 when she tumbled down a flight of stairs at South Avondale Elementary School. An undetected hairline fracture in her hip led eventually to seven operations on her legs and two hip replacements.

        She spent five months of 1968 in a body cast. “When I got home (from a convalescent facility), my mother and father had friends over. Afterwards . . . my father said, "You've got to do the dishes.' I said, "I can't, Dad, I'm handicapped.'

        “He said, "No, what you'll do is you'll take this crutch and put it under this arm and you'll take that crutch and put it under the other arm, and you'll lean against the sink and do those dishes. You're handi-capable.”

        “After that, there were no pity parties.”

        Ms. JioDucci worked for United Way/Community Chest from 1980 to 1989. “My career there helped mold where I am today, a lot,” she said. “I learned there is a right way and a wrong way to go about a job.

        “When I moved to Madisonville and got involved with the kids, these were a lot of the lessons I wanted to pass along, a lot of the tough-love things that kids didn't get at home.

        “I just don't believe there's a bad kid. I believe there's a kid who needs to find a way.”

The Cincinnati Enquirer's Women of the Year
Danya Karram
Francie Schott Hiltz
J.J. Johnson-JioDucci
Jane Lampke Bracken
Mary Frances Williams Clauder
Mauri J. Willis
Merri Gaither Smith
Sherrie Lou Noel
Sisters Mary Ann Fuerst and Alice Marie Soete
The Rev. Dr. Cinda Gorman
Past Enquirer Women of the Year