ACCESS (Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services)

01 / The story of this place

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ACCESS started in 1971 as a small storefront operation in Dearborn's South End, founded by a group of volunteers to help Arab immigrants navigate life in the United States: English classes, job placement, translation, whatever the community needed. In 1973 the Yemeni Benevolent Association bought the building at Saulino Court and gave it to ACCESS free of charge, and the organization's administrative offices have stood there ever since. Ismael Ahmed, who co-founded the organization, became its executive director in 1983 and spent the next quarter century turning it into the largest Arab American nonprofit in the country, with dozens of programs in health, education, employment and the arts. Ahmed later served as Michigan's director of Human Services under Governor Jennifer Granholm. ACCESS now runs more than a hundred programs across metro Detroit, and it also created the nearby Arab American National Museum.

1. Founded in 1971 in a South End Dearborn storefront
2. Its Saulino Court building was donated by the Yemeni Benevolent Association in 1973
3. Ismael Ahmed ran it from 1983 into the 2000s
4. Now the largest Arab American nonprofit in the United States
5. Created the nearby Arab American National Museum