Good morning, Northwest Ohio. Fall is just around the corner, and there’s plenty happening across the Greater Toledo area as we head into another busy stretch for the region’s business community. From continued investment and development to the people and organizations driving growth across Northwest Ohio, there’s no shortage of things worth paying attention to.

Before we jump in, thank you. Every week, more readers choose to spend part of their Friday morning with Toledo Money. What started as a simple idea to better connect Northwest Ohio’s business community has grown into more than 1,300 subscribers, thousands of followers across social media, and a growing network of professionals who genuinely care about what’s happening in our region. We don’t take that for granted.

This week, we’re turning our attention to a different part of the Greater Toledo story.

We’re introducing the inaugural Toledo Money Most Influential Healthcare Leaders list.

This is our attempt to identify the individuals helping shape healthcare across Northwest Ohio and, by extension, the future of our region.

One of Toledo Money’s goals is to build the most informed business intelligence network in Northwest Ohio. That means understanding not just the companies and institutions driving growth, but the people behind them. Healthcare is one of the most important parts of our regional economy, and the leaders featured in this edition are helping influence how our community delivers care, attracts talent, invests in new capabilities, and grows.

Will we miss people? Absolutely. And that’s part of the process. We expect this to evolve each year with your insights, making it a stronger reflection of the people shaping Northwest Ohio’s healthcare and economy.

As always, thanks for reading. Let’s get into today’s edition.

This week’s shoutout goes to the real behind-the-scenes champ of Toledo Money: my wife, Megan Laranga.

As Toledo Money continues to grow, so does the time that comes with it — phone calls at odd hours, long conversations with Kaden about growth and strategy, and calls from local developers that somehow seem to come while we’re hauling two kids through Costco.

Building something like Toledo Money takes a lot of time that people never see. So this week, I want to recognize the person who makes it possible for me to keep putting that time in.

Thank you, Meg, for supporting the chaos, the ambition and all the hours that go into making Toledo Money hum.

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Thousands across Northwest Ohio read Toledo Money each week. Among them are healthcare leaders whose work is actively shaping the region’s economy, institutions, and communities. Healthcare is big business in NW Ohio, from hospitals and health systems to physician practices, research, senior care, and the many organizations supporting the region’s healthcare ecosystem. Whether it's leading a major health system, expanding access to care, advancing medical innovation, or helping build the next generation of healthcare professionals, these honorees are dedicated to making Northwest Ohio a healthier and stronger place to live and work.

And these movers and shakers of the healthcare industry aren't just making strides in healthcare. They're fostering the next generation of leadership. When they're not leading organizations or advancing patient care, they're making an impact on their communities because they don't just work here, they live here, and they're among the region's biggest supporters.

Without further ado, welcome to Toledo Money's Most Influential Healthcare Leaders.

Ronda Lehman, PharmD, MBA, FACHE, has spent more than three decades building her career inside the same healthcare system she now helps lead across Northwest Ohio. She joined Mercy Health in 1995 as a pharmacy intern, never imagining that one day she would be responsible for both its Lima and Toledo markets. Along the way, Lehman worked across pharmacy, hospital operations, physician practices, population health and ambulatory care; giving her an unusually complete view of how healthcare actually reaches a community.

Today, that experience places her in one of the most consequential leadership positions in the region. Lehman oversees Mercy Health’s operations across Lima and Toledo, including a seven-hospital Toledo market serving patients throughout a 20-county footprint in Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan. Her influence extends well beyond hospital walls, touching physician recruitment, workforce development, behavioral health, community partnerships and where Mercy chooses to invest next.

Her story is also distinctly Northwest Ohio: build expertise, stay close to the community and keep taking on greater responsibility. From pharmacy intern to dual-market president, Lehman’s career offers a powerful reminder that some of the region’s most influential leaders are not imported into Northwest Ohio; they are developed here.

Chris Becker, President and CEO of Bionix, represents a different kind of healthcare influence in Northwest Ohio: building something here that reaches far beyond the region. Becker has spent more than two decades growing with the Maumee-based medical-device company, moving through marketing, sales and executive leadership before ultimately becoming President and CEO. Along the way, he has helped Bionix evolve from a local healthcare business into a recognized name in medical-device innovation.

Today, Becker leads Bionix as it develops practical tools designed to make everyday clinical care safer, simpler and more efficient. That work continues with the company’s 2026 launch of the OneLight Illumination Platform, expanding Bionix’s ability to support common ear, nose and throat procedures.

Becker’s story is also a distinctly Northwest Ohio one. A University of Toledo graduate with both a bachelor’s degree and MBA, he has built his career close to home while helping a homegrown company compete on a much larger stage. His influence comes from proving that healthcare innovation does not have to leave Northwest Ohio to matter elsewhere.

Arturo Polizzi, President and CEO of ProMedica, has taken on one of the most consequential leadership assignments in Northwest Ohio healthcare: restoring stability to one of the region’s largest and most important institutions. A ProMedica veteran, Polizzi first joined the organization in 1998 as an in-house attorney and spent more than two decades moving through legal, human resources, hospital operations and enterprise leadership before eventually returning as COO and becoming CEO.

His tenure has been defined by financial repair. Polizzi inherited an organization facing significant operating losses, debt pressure and difficult strategic decisions, and has helped lead a broad turnaround focused on improving performance, simplifying the organization and rebuilding long-term financial sustainability. That work matters well beyond ProMedica’s balance sheet. The health system is deeply tied to Northwest Ohio through its hospitals, physicians, employees, philanthropy and economic footprint, making its stability an important regional issue.

Perhaps most importantly, Polizzi has helped preserve ProMedica as a Toledo-headquartered, locally controlled institution rather than allowing financial distress to dictate its future. His story is not simply one of running a health system—it is one of protecting and rebuilding a Northwest Ohio asset with generations of history behind it. Polizzi’s influence comes from helping ensure that one of Toledo’s most important healthcare institutions remains strong, independent and rooted in the community it was built to serve.

Dr. Charles Callahan, Executive Vice President for Health Affairs at The University of Toledo, represents a different kind of healthcare influence in Northwest Ohio: the region’s ability to recruit experienced national talent to help build its next generation of academic medicine. Callahan arrived in Toledo in 2025 after a long career at Memorial Health in Illinois, where he ultimately led a five-hospital system and served as President and CEO of the 500-bed Springfield Memorial Hospital.

At UToledo, Callahan became the first person to hold the newly created Executive Vice President for Health Affairs position, giving him responsibility for bringing the University’s clinical, physician and academic healthcare organizations under a more unified strategy. His work sits at the intersection of UTMC, University of Toledo Physicians and the College of Medicine and Life Sciences — institutions that influence patient care, as well as, physician training, medical research and the future healthcare workforce of Northwest Ohio.

Callahan’s arrival is important for another reason. His career includes hospital operations, healthcare quality and process improvement, clinical research and more than 50 professional publications, making his recruitment a statement about what Toledo can attract. His influence comes not only from what he is building at UToledo Health, but from what his decision to come here represents: Northwest Ohio can compete for accomplished healthcare leaders nationally and give them an opportunity to shape an institution, and a region, in a meaningful way.

Successful local entrepreneur Ron DeLeeuw is taking another swing, this time placing a 48,000-square-foot social club in the backyard of one of the region’s most engaged pickleball populations.

Ron DeLeeuw has already built one successful consumer-service business in Northwest Ohio. Now, the founder of Pups Paradise is turning his attention to a very different kind of customer — but with a similar strategy: identify a growing demand, build around the customer experience and put the business where the users already are.

That is the thesis behind Rally Point Social Club, now under construction at the northeast corner of Jerome and Monclova roads.

The 48,000-square-foot facility is expected to open next spring with 10 indoor and five outdoor pickleball courts, four golf simulators, food and beverage service and additional social activities.

But the more interesting story may be the location.

Rally Point is being built in one of western Lucas County’s most strategically positioned residential corridors — surrounded by established housing, an aging population with significant leisure demand and continued residential growth extending through Monclova, Waterville, Whitehouse and the surrounding area.

And DeLeeuw does not have to speculate about whether nearby residents play pickleball.

Residents of the nearby Waterside community showed up for Rally Point’s Aug. 31 groundbreaking. Of the senior community’s roughly 602 homes, approximately 105 residents participate in its pickleball group.

That means Rally Point is effectively bringing dedicated indoor courts to one of the region’s most engaged groups of players, almost literally in their backyard.

For a sport with particularly strong participation among older adults, the combination of demographics, proximity and year-round indoor access makes the location noteworthy.

And on a much less scientific level, perhaps it will finally convince my favorite neighbor, Greg, to spend a little more of the winter in Northwest Ohio so we can get a few games in.

Rally Point also carries more credibility because this is not DeLeeuw’s first entrepreneurial venture.

He previously founded Pups Paradise, growing the locally created dog daycare and boarding concept into operations in Sylvania and Perrysburg.

Rally Point is a larger and more capital-intensive bet, but the underlying playbook is familiar: build around a recurring activity, create a destination rather than a transaction and develop a customer base that has reasons to return several times per week.

The club is designed to capture customers throughout the day, from early-morning players and retirees to families, students and corporate groups.

The financing structure is another piece worth watching.

DeLeeuw received no a tax abatement or traditional tax incentive for the development. Instead, he worked with a local Credit Union and the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority to obtain financing for the project.

That is an important distinction.

Economic development does not always mean a municipality writing an incentive check. Organizations such as the Port Authority can play another role; helping connect private investment with financing tools that allow projects to move forward.

Here, the result is a privately operated business making a substantial investment in a growing part of Lucas County, with public-sector economic development infrastructure helping facilitate the capital behind it.

Pickleball is ultimately the product, but location may be Rally Point’s biggest advantage.

DeLeeuw is putting a year-round recreational business next to an established population already playing the sport, in an affluent part of the region that continues to add households and purchasing power.

Sometimes the smartest business strategy is simply building next door to the people already asking for it.

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