Partner
Melinda (Mindy) Ward provides clients with a high level of efficient service and expertise in complex estate, business, and gift and tax planning issues. She is well-versed in handling wills and trusts, family limited partnerships, limited liability companies, S corporations, irrevocable trusts, charitable trusts, and other sophisticated estate and business planning devices. In addition, Mindy advises clients in all types of fiduciary controversies, administers estates and trusts, and prepares federal and state individual, estate, gift, corporate, and generation-skipping tax returns, as well as fiduciary income tax returns for estates and trusts.
A member of the Kansas City Estate Planning Society and the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association (Taxation and Probate Committees), Mindy is admitted to the Missouri, Kansas, and Colorado bars. She was the first recipient of the Estate Planning Society Award and is a past co-chair of the Greater Kansas City Leave A Legacy. She has been featured as a speaker at numerous seminars on estate planning, probate, and ethics.
Mindy was selected as a Missouri & Kansas Rising Star from 2008 to 2013 and has regularly been named a Super Lawyer in the years since. Most recently, She was selected as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in Missouri and Kansas and made the Top 50 Women Lawyers in Kansas City list 2015-2018. She is also rated as an AV Preeminent Lawyer by her peers.
While attending law school at UMKC, Mindy served on the Law Review and the Urban Lawyer and graduated at the top of her class.
Community Involvement
- Children’s Mercy Hospital Donald H. Chisholm Planned Giving Council, Past-Chairman
- Ella C. Loose Heritage Society Advisory Board for the benefit of Gillis, Past-Chairman
Memberships
- Kansas City Estate Planning Society
- Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association Taxation and Probate Committees
Distinctions
- Best Lawyers in America, 2022-2023
- Missouri and Kansas Super Lawyers, 2014-2022
- Missouri and Kansas Super Lawyers, Rising Stars, 2008-2013
- Top 50 Women Lawyers in Kansas City, 2015-present
- Martindale-Hubbell AV Preeminent Lawyer
Contact Mindy Ward at 913.327.5140 or mward@spencerfane.com.