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James L. Spigarelli, PhD, Chair
Cynthia B. Spaeth, Immediate Past Chair
Barbara F. Atkinson, MD, Vice Chair
Edward S. Stevens, Secretary
Drew Billingsley, Treasurer
Kevin Barth
James M. Beck
Robert J. Belt, MD
Mary Beth Blake, Founder
Rick Green
Gail Hackett, PhD
Theodore J. Hempy
Sean K. Hogan
Ronald A. Neville
Julie L. Quirin, FACHE
Verneda Bachus Robinson
Rev. Norman F. Rotert
Hans W. Uffelmann, PhD, Founder
John G. Carney
MEd, President and CEO
 John G. Carney became the President and CEO of the Center for Practical Bioethics on December 1, 2011. He succeeds Myra Christopher who served in that role since the Center’s inception in 1985.
Two decades of hospice, palliative care and healthcare management experience prepared John Carney for his first leadership role at the Center as its vice president of Aging and End of Life from 2004 through 2010.
Following a brief appointment in 2011 as executive director of Crossroads Hospice to launch its Kansas presence, Carney returns to serve as the Center’s second president. He holds an undergraduate degree in philosophy from Newman University (Wichita, KS) and masters in counseling from Wichita State University.
His executive leadership positions include professional and volunteer organizations at the local provider, state and national associations levels. His passionate voice advocating for families facing difficult healthcare decisions has been heard in rural Kansas town halls to national forums from coast to coast.
His policy and advocacy work has entailed testifying in state capitals, co-authoring a report to Congress and working with the Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes of Health on improving end of life care for all Americans.
Prior to his return to the Midwest in 2004, he spent time in the nation’s capital in leadership positions with the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization and America’s Health Insurance Plans.
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Linda Doolin Ward
Executive Vice President/Chief Operating Officer
 Linda Doolin Ward’s career includes teaching, operations, marketing, communications, training and development, strategic planning and investor relations in both for profit and not for profit sectors.
In 2001, she joined Health Midwest, the largest healthcare system in the Kansas City region. She served as executive vice president-corporate relations and was part of the team that led Health Midwest through the sale to HCA, the nation’s leading investor-owned hospital company.
The sale was said to be the largest transaction of its kind in U.S. history and created the GKC Healthcare Foundation and REACH Foundation.
Linda joined the staff of the Center for Practical Bioethics after serving on the board. She is now Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. The Center is a freestanding bioethics center dedicated to raising and responding to ethical issues in health and health care. She has responsibility for finance/audit, planning, governance, resource development including endowment and planned giving as well as operations and program funding, membership, human resources, and has worked with area benefits leaders to develop a corporate program offering employees education in advance care planning as well as coaching and advocacy when dealing with advanced illness.
She serves on the board of MetroCare/NorthlandCare, a program incubated at the Center which provides specialty care for people without access to care. She is also a member of the GKC Chamber of Commerce Healthcare Council and KU Med Center’s Institute for Neurological Disorders Advisory Council.
She has participated as retreat facilitator with the Frontiers Leadership Team, a regional consortium managing a $20 million dollar CTSA – Clinical and Translational Science Award.
She serves on the board for the United Way of Greater Kansas City and chairs their Health Impact Council. She was the first woman to serve as chairman of the board of trustees of Westminster College and was honored by them with an honorary doctorate of humane letters in 2004. After 23 years on that board, she was named a life trustee in 2009. She is a director of Lawson Bank.
Linda is an active participant in the Women’s Public Service Network, and recently co-founded the Northland Giving Circle. She is immediate past chair of the Port Authority of Kansas City, Missouri, which focuses on development of the Riverfront and the former Richards-Gebaur air base. She served on the founding board of the Northland Community Foundation and continued on that board for 21 years, four years as chair. The fund has grown from nothing but an idea at its founding in 1987 to assets of nearly $50 million.
She is also past chair of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Kansas City, the Missouri Children’s Trust Fund, The Harvest Ball and the Women’s Foundation of Greater Kansas City. She is past vice-chair of the Partnership for Children and Crittenden.
Linda has been honored by the communities she has served including being named a Churchill Fellow of Westminster College and Central Exchange Woman of the Year. She is the recipient of the Gillis ‘Spirit of Kansas City’ Award, the Ann Robb Townsend Award for Business Leadership, and Kansas City Tomorrow’s Distinguished Alumni Award, and in 2007 was honored with the Look North Award from the Clay County Economic Development Council. In 2009, she received the prestigious Pinnacle Award from the Northland Community Foundation.
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