2006 Corporate and Non-Profit Executives of the Year
Of the St. Louis American
St. Louis has attracted two of the nation’s leading African-American corporate and not-for-profit executives, respectively, during the past three years, and both are now helping the region’s residents live their lives to the fullest.
Mark Darrell brought more than 21 years of experience to Laclede Gas when he was named the utility’s general counsel in 2004.
Theresa Mayberry-Dunn was named president and CEO of Grace Hill Settlement House in 2003 after a distinguished career that included award-winning work in Illinois and the city of Boston.
Now, both call St. Louis home, neither has plans on moving on, and they have been named the respective 2006 Corporate and Non-Profit Executives of the Year by the St. Louis American Foundation.
They will be honored during the Salute to Excellence in Business Luncheon on Nov. 9 at the Renaissance Grand Hotel downtown. The event is presented by the St. Louis American Foundation, Urban league of Metropolitan St. Louis and St. Louis Regional Chamber and Growth Association.
Darrell had been assistant general counsel for NiSource, Inc., in Merrillville, Ind., before joining Laclede. He was responsible for providing support for its overall supply chain function, sales and marketing departments of its 11 natural gas and electric local distribution companies, and its environmental, health and safety departments.
Douglas H. Yaeger, Laclede’s chairman, president and CEO, calls Darrell “talented and experienced” with “experience in multiple facets of the natural gas industry.”
Darrell was with New Jersey Resources Corporation from 1992-97, last serving as vice president and assistant general counsel.
He also knows the ins and outs of being an entrepreneur.
Darrell was in a private energy practice in Washington, D.C., from 1987-92, primarily working before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the District of Columbia Public Service Commission. From 1984-87 he was counsel to the American Gas Association, and from 1982-84 he was an attorney-advisor to the United States Department of Energy.
Darrell holds a degree in political science from Syracuse University and a Juris Doctor degree (1982) from Georgetown University Law Center. He is a member of the Energy Bar Association, has served on the American Gas Association’s Legal Committee and is vice chair of the International Energy and Natural Resources Committee of the American Bar Association.
‘Neighbors helping neighbors’
Mayberry-Dunn knows that work in boardrooms is important to building stronger families in St. Louis, but she realizes that her work place must include clients’ homes.
“We express our work as ‘neighbors helping neighbors.’ We understand that providing services isn’t enough,” she says.
“You need to go through a family’s front door and engage them in change.”
Before joining Grace Hill in 2003, she served as the director of Early Care Education, Caroline and Sigmund Schott Foundation & Schott Center for Public and Early Education in Boston.
Prior to earning her Ph.D. from the Jane Adams School of Social Work at the University of Illinois, Chicago, she was the CEO of the Center for New Horizons Inc. in Chicago.
She adds, “I believe our role is to be a catalyst, to bring to the attention of public policy leaders the impact of their decisions,” she says.
Her other accomplishments include establishing the first TANF training program for research reviewers in the country and opening the first HIV emergency infant care centers in metropolitan Chicago. She also managed Illinois’ first Fatality Review Board for infants and children and reduced the number of children waiting for adoptive placement from 3,000 to 200 in three years in Cook County, Ill.
The Grace Hill organization serves 100,000 disadvantaged individuals annually throughout the Greater St. Louis Region and has a $30 million operting budget.
Grace Hill’s Family Center houses and counsels mothers and mothers-to-be experiencing substance abuse. Training programs for child care providers create new career paths for community members while they enhance quality day care options for Grace Hill families.
Parents can also expand vocational options through the Career Center, and a volunteer tax assistance program has added more than $1 million to family incomes since 2002.
Young people in Grace Hill AmeriCorps Rangers develop job skills and improve their neighborhood, as they restore the historic 12-mile Riverfront Trail along the Mississippi River.
Tickets to the 7th annual Salute to Excellence in Business Awards Luncheon are $100 for Corporate/VIP tickets, and $75 for general seating. Keynote speaker Mario Armstrong will be holding a special Technology Seminar from 9am-11am. The combo cost for attending both the seminar and luncheon is $195. For tickets and information call 314-533-8000, ext. 305.
