Simon took the reins of leadership in 1997, serving as president of the Las Colinas Association until 2007, guiding Las Colinas in its resurgence as the preeminent master planned, mixed use community in America. He is credited with “bringing the luster” back to Las Colinas. He continued to serve on the Las Colinas Association’s board of directors until 2009. 

Born in Germany in December 1934 and raised in Berlin, Simon’s formative years were spent under the most notorious dictatorship of the 20th Century. As a youngster, he saw firsthand the Battle of Berlin; the post-war miseries; the attempted isolation of Berlin in Russian-dominated territory; and the U.S. air lift to feed the city of 2.5 million people. He was 19 when he set foot on American soil in 1954.

In 1973, Simon moved his wife and two daughters to a home on the south side of Northgate Dr. in Irving. He fell in love with the emerging development, Las Colinas, and soon purchased two available lots in the University Hills residential neighborhood. Twenty-two years later, Simon officially planted roots in Las Colinas and had their new family home built amongst the tree-lined hilltop.

In 1996, when he was chairman and CEO of Industrial Properties Corporation, a developer of industrial parks in several Texas markets, he decided to relocate the company’s corporate office from Dallas to Las Colinas to take advantage of the dynamic business environment that Las Colinas possessed.

He also decided to get more personally involved in the community: “I felt very strongly about Las Colinas being my neighborhood. I felt I should invest in my neighborhood and do what I can to keep it up.”

With Ben Carpenter in poor health, Simon worried about what would happen to Las Colinas once Carpenter retired from the board. He arranged a meeting and asked Carpenter point blank, “Who’s going to take care of Las Colinas when you’re gone?”  

 After a discussion with his son John, Ben Carpenter told Simon he should do it, to which Simon responded, “Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. I did not come here for a job. I came because I love this place and I’m concerned about its future without you.”   

But after talking it over with his wife Allison, he realized if he wanted to keep Las Colinas as it was, he should agree to do it. He took on the job as president – which was an unpaid position – in May 1997.

Always on the lookout for the benefit of Las Colinas, he organized the Urban Center Task Force Committee in April 2006 to keep the interests of Las Colinas at the forefront of discussions among city leaders. He also was chairman for the city of Irving’s Tax Increment Finance District, which allowed him to push for development projects within the TIF’s boundaries in Las Colinas.

In addition, he was the primary force behind the formulation of the Las Colinas Parks Foundation, a non-profit company that works to beautify parks and open spaces across Irving and served as director/trustee of the Stemmons Foundation, a charitable trust established in 1963 to benefit Dallas area cultural, educational, and scientific communities.

By making it his mission to keep Ben Carpenter’s vision alive, Simon ensured that Las Colinas remained resilient and viable through multiple economic fluctuations and equipped Las Colinas to flourish and thrive well into the 21st Century.