10 Donald Hall, Jr. Now in his fifth year as CEO, Don Hall, Jr. oversees a staff of more than 7500 in the area and 18,000 worldwide. Despite a mature market for its core product, growth in each of the company’s operating businesses boosted Hallmark Cards’ consolidated revenue to $4.1 billion for 2006, a five percent increase over last year’s continuing operations on a com-parative basis. Look for the younger Don Hall, (Jr.) to reverse roles with the elder Don Hall and to remain solid on Ingram’s Power Elite list for some years to come.
9 Bill Zollars Although 2006 earnings were generally flat at YRC Worldwide (the erstwhile Yellow Roadway) its chair-man and CEO Bill Zollars received more than $7 million in compensation. He likely deserved it, having reversed the fortunes of this venerable company and made it a global force in competition with UPS and Fed Ex. The company now has more than 50,000 employees, 2,000 in the Kansas City area. Expect to see Zollars and YRC Worldwide continue to grow and prosper.
8 Terry Dunn Terry Dunn is president and CEO of the J.E. Dunn Construction Group. Easily KC’s largest and most influential construction company, J.E. Dunn has been a major player in most of the high profile projects in Kansas City, including the new H&R Block building, the new Federal Reserve Bank, the Performing Arts Center as well as the East Village project, a twelve-block redevelopment plan that will include the J.E. Dunn new corporte headquarters. This and much civic involvement has given Dunn the throw to match his weight. He has more than enough of the latter to ride out the mayoral transition. Wife Peggy Dunn is mayor of Leawood and both are involved in Republican politics, making the Dunns Kansas City’s power couple of their generation.
7 Neal Patterson Patterson not only runs the company he co-founded, the Cerner Corporation, but he also owns a good chunk of it. When last reported, that comes directly or indirectly to some 6.5 million shares of the world’s largest stand-alone healthcare information technology company. A very strong 2006 has pushed those share prices up to the mid-50s as of this writing. Do the math. Patterson has invested a chunk of that in impressive area real estate holdings and making the Kansas City Wizards soccer team a major league sports franchise. A maverick in the eyes of many--even if wife Jeanne could not beat Cleaver for the fifth District Congressional seat—Patterson should own a top seat on Ingram’s Power Elite spot for some time.
6 Gary Forsee Sprint Nextel always seems to be getting in the news for the wrong things, most recently for being denied the right to compete for billions in government telecommunications con-tracts over the next ten years. That much said, CEO Forsee has kept the greater part of this powerful communications giant in Overland Park after its merger with Nextel—12,000 employees, even after the Embarq spinoff—and lent the company’s name, for a rock-bottom price nonetheless, to KC’s new downtown arena. He was among those Kay Barnes petitioned.
5 Min Kao It is hard to argue with this Taiwan native’s success. Forbes has recently identified Kao, the CEO and co-founder of the Olathe-based Garmin International, as the wealthiest individual in the region. His 23 percent ownership of a business that has had a compounded annual growth rate of 30 percent of revenue and earnings per share of 28 percent in its six years as a public company has pushed his net worth to some $2.5 billion. Like Ewing Kauffman before him, The Mission Hills Kao has helped make scores of other Kansas Citians millionaires as well and provided good jobs for thousands more. Like Burrell, he has been discreet with his philanthropic giving but the University of Tennessee, his alma mater, insisted on honoring him for his $17.5 million donation, the largest in the school’s history. The top spot on this list may be his if he chooses to start throwing his weight around locally.
4 Henry Bloch This June will witness a career triumph for this industry icon when the Nelson Atkins museum opens the new $200 million Bloch Building. Public opinion has been rapidly turning in the building’s favor after several years of premature whining. Few other Kansas Citians had the wealth, the foresight, and the influence to get this sparkling new addition built. And after surviving D-Day, among other challenges, a little criticism about his choice of architect could not have cost Bloch too much sleep. Bloch continues to work each day and contributes to the future of the fabric of Kansas City perhaps like no other of his vintage.
3 Donald Hall Named CEO of Hallmark in 1966, Don Hall wasted no time mixing it up. Two years later, the company broke ground on the $500 million Crown Center complex, financed entirely with company funds. The complex helped reshape the entire city. Although retired from active management, the youngest of the three children of Hallmark founder Joyce Hall still owns more than $1 billion worth of company stock and that buys a lot of influence, especially when your son is the CEO. He and influential wife Adele have no real peer as a local power couple.
2 Tom McDonnell As mentioned, the CEO of DST chose the winning candidate in the mayoral race and that can’t hurt DST’s prospects. In addition to its core business providing information processing and computer software services and products, DST has become a major force in the real estate market in downtown and midtown areas, including the luxury condominium market. Its many and disparate Kansas City offices house more than 5,000 em-ployees, the most in Jackson County. McDonnell is also one of only six members of the Garmin board.
1 James Stowers, Jr. The founder of American Century, Jim Stowers show-ed that, at 83, he wasn’t too old to play hardball when he invested nearly $30 million of his own money into the statewide battle to gain constitutional protection for embryonic stem cell research. That investment was essential in passing Amendment 2 and securing the Kansas City future of the Stowers Institute with its 400 scientists and $2 billion worth of endowments. The threat of his moving the Institute to Kansas or out of the area had unsettled the politics on both sides of the state line. His passion for embryonic stem cell research also made Stowers a lot of enemies, which did not seem to trouble this man on a mission. As he knows, without his and wife Virginia’s original investment, there would not have been a life scienc-es movement in Kansas City.
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