50 Keith Copaken

The family-owned commercial real estate development firm, Copaken, White & Blitt, showed its commitment to a renewed downtown with its planned move from Leawood to the Town Pavilion in downtown Kansas City where the company was launched eighty-five years ago. Keith Copaken serves as the Chairman of the firm’s leadership group, which includes his brother Jon. The firm has developed an impressive lineup of properties in Kansas City including the Town Pavilion and the Plaza Colonnade and serves as property manager for the new West Edge project on the Plaza. Parents Paul and Bunni Copaken have been such enduring contributors to the arts that the Kansas City Rep named its new downtown theater the “Copaken Stage” in their honor.

49 Jeannette Nichols

The daughter-in-law of Country Club Plaza founder, J.C. Nichols, Jeannette Nichols was named “Outstanding Kansas Citian 2006” by the Native Sons of Greater Kansas City. They had good cause. Among other endeavors, Mrs. Nichols serves as honorary co-chair of UMKC’s $200 million capital campaign and is guiding the expansion of UMKC’s Miller Nichols library, named for her late husband. She also serves on the campaign steering committees of both the Kansas City Public Library and the Metropolitan Kansas City Performing Arts Center. By all accounts, Jeannette Nichols has the resources and the will to make things happen.

48 Dan Hesse

A cool new name and identity has given Sprint’s local telecommunications spinoff new life. As the first CEO of Embarq, Dan Hesse, a long-time AT&T executive, has an impressive dominion over which to rule. Embarq, in fact, is the nation’s fourth-largest wire-line carrier with 6.9 million access lines in 18 states and 20,000 employees, 4,000 of them in the area. An $11 million compensation package in 2006 is testament to Hesse’s own value on the market. He is still just getting his fins wet in Kansas City’s power pond and he should earn some kudos if he moves Embarq headquarters to downtown Kansas City.

47 Jim Nutter

As something of a “last hurrah”—his own term—this long-time political power broker made the tough decision to throw his considerable weight behind Mark Funkhouser in the general election. That may have made the difference. The business’ residual power will pass to his son, Jim Nutter, Jr., the president of Kansas City-based James B. Nutter & Co., which operates in all 50 states and controls roughly four percent of the national reverse mortgage market. Nutter’s long-standing political power among Democrats is up for the taking.

46 Karen Pletz

In her twelve years as president and CEO of Kansas City University of Medicine and Bioscience, Karen Pletz has helped transform KCUMB into a serious research institution as well as a leading medical school. The University’s 45,000 square-foot Dybedal Center for Biosciences Research is the first new research facility to be completed by a private academic institution in Kansas City. Pletz has made her presence felt in the community civically by serving on the boards of Kansas City Southern, Commerce Bank, the Civic Council, the Kansas City Area Development Council (KCADC), MRI, Rockhurst University, and as chairwoman of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce.

45 John Bluford III

It was in 1999 that John Bluford took over as CEO of Truman Medical Centers and things have not been the same since. Thanks to Bluford’s strong emphasis on quality, customer service and clinical outcome, TMC has emerged as one of the nation’s Top Five Academic Health Centers, according to the University Health-System Consortium. TMC’s $27 million investment in technology over seven years, in coordination with Cerner and others, has also earned it the designation of one of the nation’s “most wired” hospitals. Last year, Modern Healthcare ranked Bluford the 33rd most powerful person in health care nationwide, an overstatement but an understandable one. Locally, Bluford is making his presence felt as Chairman of the Greater Kansas City Chamber.

44 John Sherman

Forget jazz and barbecue, the president and CEO of the Plaza-based Inergy, John Sherman, is helping to make Kansas City something of a national propane capital. Inergy is now among the fastest growing master limited partnerships in the country. The company serves some 700,000 retail customers from more than 300 customer service centers throughout the eastern half of the United States. Inergy also runs a natural gas storage business among other operations.

43 Jim Spigarelli

The president and CEO of Midwest Research Institute, Jim Spigarelli manages a staff of some 1,800 scientists and other professionals. Post 9/11, MRI has taken on an imposing variety of national defense related projects. Locally, Spigarelli and MRI have been critical in breathing life into the life sciences movement. He has chaired both the Kansas City Area Life Science Institute and the Civic Council’s life science initiative. Though nearing the later stage of his career, Spigarelli has assembled the most powerful board of any local organization, and it should keep his mission alive.

42 Frank Ellis

As founder, chairman, and CEO of Swope Community Enterprises, Frank Ellis has been quietly building a mini-Empire east of the Plaza. These enterprises now include Swope Health Services, Swope Community Builders, Applied Urban Research Institute, and Swope Community Enterprise Ser-vices. Ellis has created a high civic profile by serving on the boards of the Economic Development Council, the Greater Kansas City Chamber, the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, KCADC, and Rockhurst University.

41 Greg Graves

Now in his fourth year as CEO of employee-owned engineering powerhouse Burns & McDonnell, Greg Graves has nicely settled into the power structure of Kansas City. He is a member of the Civic Council and serves on the boards of the Economic Development Corporation, MRI, KCADC, the Kansas City Sports Commission, the Greater Kansas City Chamber, and UMB. Burns & McDonnell employs 2,200 professional and support personnel and generates annual revenues of $750 million.