Harley Russell

Harley Russell had devoted his life to community development until a change in his health broadened the scope of his philanthropy. Born and raised in Topeka, Harley came to Leavenworth in 1962. A pharmacist by training, he and his wife owned six pharmacies for more than 20 years. After selling the businesses in 1987, he was asked to become involved in what was then the Leavenworth National Bank & Trust Company. “I had been on the board for many years,” he recalls, “so they asked me to step up and help them with a facility they had just opened for six months.”  Twenty years later, Harley remains at the renamed MidAmerican Bank & Trust Company as executive vice president. Promoting the economy of Leavenworth has always been of importance to him. He is one of the founders of Leavenworth Area Development, (now the Leavenworth County Development Corporation), in which he is still active, most recently as Infrastructure Committee chair. In addition, he is involved in the Economic Restructuring Committee for Leavenworth Main Street Program, St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, the Kansas Pharmacy Foundation executive committee, and the advisory council for the University of Kansas School of Pharmacy. After he was diagnosed with inclusion-body myositis, a rare inflammatory disease unknown even to some doctors, Harley took his passion for effecting change into the world of human services. In 2001 he organized “Keep in Touch,” a support group active in Kansas, Nebraska, the western half of Missouri, and a part of Iowa. “As a pharmacist, I have worked with sick people for many years,” Harley explains. “I know the value of support groups.” For all his concerns and interests, Harley remains passionate about the development his community, a topic never far from his mind. “Leavenworth is a great place to live,” he says. “The people here have been very good to me and my family.”

Father Pat Tobin

In his more than fifty years as a Catholic priest, Father Pat Tobin has led missions abroad, promoted charity programs in the Kansas City area, and guided a congregation of 3,200 families in the Northland. As a young pastor at what was then Annunciation Parish, he wrote a letter to Mother Teresa asking for a tape-recorded message of encouragement for his students. The correspondence initiated a relationship that would span decades. During that time Fr. Pat led retreats in 31 countries, often with Mother Teresa by his side. He also stayed active in Kansas City. In 1978, Father Pat helped found Harvesters, the organization that today helps feed 60,000 area residents. He has worked for Catholic Charities, as both a staff member and a member of the board, for a total of 49 years. He has also been an advocate for the United Way, averaging 100 talks a year for 21 years. Today, Father Pat is associate pastor at St. Therese Parish in the Northland. In addition to making the rounds in classrooms and leading a bible school, he serves as the chaplain of St. Luke’s Northland Hospital and North Kansas City Hospital. The post “delights” him, he explains, “because it is a great relief to the families.” Father Pat’s work overseas has inspired his most recent mission, an international water relief effort. “When I was working with Mother Teresa, I would see a mother carrying an eight-gallon jug of water on her head that she knew was putrid.” Concerned that 17 percent of the world’s population lacks access to safe water, he has become involved in a campaign to distribute small, water-purifying packets to needy regions. For the 83 percent of the world living in relative comfort, he believes that work towards this cause is an imperative. After all, Father Pat’s motto is to “comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.”

 

Peter Yelorda

As a pre-med major and a college athlete at Eastern Michigan University, Peter Yelorda had his eye on playing professional football. After an injury, however, he set his sights on a career in public administration. He had received his master’s degree from the University of Michigan and was working as human services director of Washtenaw County, Michigan, when he received a call from the former county administrator inviting him to join him in Kansas City as assistant city manager. Peter’s first trip to Kansas City in 1995 perplexed him. “That first impression was really nice, staying at Crown Center and seeing the Plaza,” he recalls. “But I was also surprised at how depressed the downtown area was at the time, all the major buildings boarded up.” As assistant city manager, and later executive vice president and chief administrative officer at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City, he has worked to address Kansas City’s challenges in both a professional and personal capacity. “You see challenges but a lot of potential too,” he comments. One of the major challenges Peter identifies is the revitalization of the Jazz District, “a critical part of Kansas City’s identity and its history.” He now serves as co-chair for the Jazz District Redevelopment Corporation. He has also devoted nine years to the TIF Commission, of which he is the former chair. His involvement with TIF has caused him to ask, “How can we make this city better, and create opportunities to share?”  Answering his own question, Peter serves on an exhaustive range of boards: Union Station, UMKC, KCPT, the Urban League, the Midwest Research Institute, and the Full Employment Council, which he recently chaired. “Everything tends to overlap as a part of the puzzle to make the community better.” A “baby-boomer” and native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Peter is the father of four.