217 E Court Street, commonly known as the Jaffe Building, was acquired by the Kankakee County Regional Land Bank. The building occupies a prominent location in the heart of downtown Kankakee and housed Jaffe Drugs, an establishment that served the city for many decades. According to the Kankakee County Museum, Max Jaffe initially had a drug store on E. Cypress. The Jaffe Drug Store at 217 E Court opened in 1933.  This business was actively listed with Kankakee City Directory up to 2003, which is the last year in the museum’s archives. It closed not long after. The Jaffe family was active in many business ventures in the city and county and was instrumental in the founding of Temple B’Nai in Kankakee.

During the long period the business has been closed, the building has fallen into a state of disrepair. Items from the pharmacy remain in the building and need to be removed before it can be marketed for sale. The land bank is working with the City of Kankakee to perform interior clean out. Once it has been cleaned out, the land bank will solicit proposals for the building’s redevelopment. Given its condition, the land bank will be looking for qualified developers with concrete plans to rehab it and bring it back to productive use.