Top 15 High Demand Jobs in America's Richest Cities: Mission Hills KS

Mission Hills is located approximately 5 miles south of the Kansas City Kansas-Missouri metropolitan area and about 5 miles northeast of another suburb - one with a long railroading history, Overland Park. This places Mission Hills among some high-traffic metro areas and suburbs in a position very attractive for job search and career building.

The highway system around Mission Hills is large and promotes easy access. On maps, we see the major highway I-35 to the west of town, running northeast into the I-635 Kansas City outerbelt. Several state highways add their support of the National Interstate System as well, with another major interstate, I-70 running east and west just north of Mission Hills and cutting through Kansas City. If that were not enough, I-435 encircles the entire Kansas City Metro Area, including several suburbs, providing entrances about 5 miles west of Mission Hills.

COUNTRY CLUBS

This region of the state is filled with parks, golf courses, and country clubs. Mission Hills was, in fact, begun as a type of planned community (a country club district) to surround the Mission Hills Country Club and to accommodate its golfers and club members. Home to several wealthy residents, the median household income is reported by Forbes.com as $243.000 annually.

• Blenheim Square Research Hospital
• Indian Hills Country Club
• Jacob L. Loose Park
• Kansas City Art Institute - www.kcai.edu
• Kansas City Country Club
• Meadow Lake Park
• Milburn Golf Club - just east of I-35
• Mission Hills Country Club
• Mission Mart Shopping Center
• Neal Peterson Park
• Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art - in Southmoreland - www.nelson-atkins.org‎
• Park Central Research Park - south of Southmoreland
• Porter Park
• Plaza Westport - just south of Old Westport
• Prairie Village Shopping Center
• Rockhurst University - www.rockhurst.edu
• Santa Fe Trail Park
• Shawnee Mission State Park
• Swope Park and Swope Memorial Golf Course
• University of Missouri at Kansas City - south of Southmoreland - www.umkc.edu
• Windsor Park

Ever wonder where the term bogus for phony, mocking, or contrived started?

The Christian church in the Western US Territories pursued a mission with the Shawnee Nation, with the intent of bettering their lives. Regardless of the success or lack thereof in this mission, it resulted in 16 buildings (three brick buildings still standing) used in the project near present-day Mission Hills. Below is a scene shot outside the East Building that features an early Conestoga wagon; and farther below is a picture of the official historical marker outside the entrance to the historic mission building.

Notice that the East Building became the site of meetings that passed the Bogus Laws to extend slavery in Kansas. Thus, while thinking to serve one minority, the mission lent its building to disserving another minority in 1855. This is a kind of double face slap for the Native American considering that 600 years of oral history have told me that the Indigenous Peoples were the first to be enslaved by others in the New World, but also that the bondage did not hold. Some of the peoples enslaved one another, this is true, but for an outside culture to enslave either Indigenous or African has been considered by many Native Americans as morally wrong.

The Shawnee Mission complex is a National Landmark that stands to the west of Mission Hills in Fairway KS, really only several blocks away. The term bogus may have had its start in the East Building of the Shawnee Mission.

A total of over 31,300 job listings (February 2011) for Mission Hills are located, in descending order of numbers of available jobs, in the following cities and additional suburbs in both Kansas and Missouri: Kansas City MO; Overland Park, Kansas City, and Lenexa KS; Independence, MO; Olathe, Shawnee Mission, Shawnee KS. Overland Park has experienced a greater increase in jobs proportionately than the other cities listed.

The large highway network in and through Mission Hills and Kansas City is discussed above. In addition, mass trandport covers part of this area.

The Metro is the local bus system (click here) of Kansas City, MO, serving some parts of Kansas. Some online commenters in 2009 were of two minds about the buses. Some liked the system very much, others thought that more buses should run after 7:00 PM in Downtown Kansas City, MO.

In January 2011 another MAX rapid transit route was added to the first one Downtown. The related website offers maps and timetables that are useful, and tips for riding. The system offers buses, light rail, rapid transit, and urban street cars. Nearly $25,000,000 in federal grants has been applied to the system and its highways, with another $5 Million from other sources.

Another department, Unified Government Transit (UGT), offers bus routes into the city limits of Kansas City, Kansas in Wyandotte County. This includes "The Bus" on fixed routes, Dial-A-Ride, and various senior services. However, Mission Hills is in Johnson County outside Wyandotte. It is possible to ride a bike or walk to the end of the busline; and Kansas City KS is only 5 miles away.

A ride-sharing program also operates from headquarters in Kansas City, MO.

The 3,000 job listings within 5 miles of Mission Hills:

1. Retail Consultants, Bilingual - Spanish
2. Account Managers
3. Taco Bell Shift Leads and Asst Mgrs
4. .Net Developers
5. Secretaries
6. Salespeople
7. Sales Managers
8. Cooks
9. Physical Therapists
10. Owner Operators - Trucking
11. Software Engineers
12. Company Drivers
13. Patient Care Associates (PCAs)
14. Collections Specialists
15. Nursing positions

1. IBM - About 10 times the number of jobs as available at Number 2 below.
2. Brookdale Senior Living
3. HCA and HCA Midwest
4. Taco Bell and Pizza Hut
5. Deloitt
6. Shawnee Mission Medical Center
7. Black & Veatch
8. Apria Healthcare
9. Aerotek
10. United States Air Force - Olathe and Kansas City
11. Carondelet Health
12. Saint Luke's Health System
13. Burns & Mcdonnell
14. Securus
15. US Resources Healthcare
16. Quintiles Transnational

Data on the richest places in the USA is provided by the US Census Bureau, based on median household incomes found in these surveys administered from 2005 - 2009. All of these median incomes are higher than competiting publications' findings from other sources in January 2011.

1. Westlake TX
2. Kenilworth III
3. Mission Hills KS
4. Popponesset Island MA (ties with Mission Hills)
5. Plandome NY
6. Hewlett Neck NY
7. Munsey Park NY
8. Plandome Manor NY
9. North Beach FL
10. Village of Chevy Chase Section Five, MD (ties with North Beach)

Reference Link:

• America's Most Affluent Neighborhoods - Forbes.com
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