Baker University officials honored a health care professional, a couple who farms and a commercial real estate agent Tuesday during their annual Partners-In-Progress breakfast.

Donna Bell, executive director of Brandon Woods Retirement Community, received the Lawrence Businessperson of the Year Award. Roger and Sue Pine, owners of Lawrence-based Pine Family Farms, received the Outstanding Leadership and Achievement in Business Award. Kelvin Heck, branch broker for the Lawrence office of Grubb & Ellis/The Winbury Group, received the university’s Special Civic Award.

Bell, who oversees the $3.5 million Brandon Woods Retirement Community and its 250 employees, urged other business leaders to become active in volunteer activities and to serve as an example for youths.

“When you go home and visit with your young people tonight, please remind them of the joys of volunteering,” Bell said. “You get so much more out of it than you give.”

Bell served eight years on the Lawrence Memorial Hospital Board of Trustees and continues to serve on boards for the United Way of Douglas County and the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce.

Bell told the crowd that she tried to follow the advice of her favorite book “Things Worth Knowing.”

“In the book it asks what in your life is worth telling,” Bell said. “One gentlemen made a simple statement. He said make your days worth remembering. That, I’ve decided, is what I really try to do everyday.”

The Pines, who oversee a 3,700-acre family farming operation, were lauded for championing agriculture issues on both a national and local level.

Honored at Baker University's Partners-In-Progress breakfast are from left, Kelvin Heck, Special Civic Award; Roger and Sue Pine, Outstanding Leadership and Achievement in Business Award; and Donna Bell, Businessperson of the Year Award. The recipients were honored Tuesday at the Lawrence Holidome.

“They really are one of our most important links between the city and the rural interests in our community,” said Larry McElwain, a longtime friend of the Pines, who introduced them. “They really are serving as ambassadors for agriculture and the American family.”

Roger Pine has served on the boards of the Corn Growers Assn. and the U.S. Grains Council. Sue Pine serves as a Lawrence-Douglas County planning commissioner and as member of the Lawrence-Douglas County Economic Development Board.

Heck credited his late father, former county commissioner and civic leader Art Heck, with much of his desire to serve the community.

“If there was a good thing to be done, Dad was out there doing it, and Mom was always asking what she could do to help,” Heck said. “I guess some of that rubbed off on me. I just couldn’t avoid it with him because he made that type of attitude so contagious.”

In addition to his real estate activities, Heck is the chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and served as the co-chairman of the chamber’s ECO2 task force.