50 Most Influential

Melissa Blake

Melissa Blake – Mayor, The Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo

Melissa Blake’s thorough trouncing of incumbent Doug Faulkner in the Wood Buffalo mayoralty race in October caused some surprise among political commentators in Edmonton and Calgary, some of whom mentioned the 35-year-old’s youthful appearance. That same shock didn’t register in Fort McMurray, where the two-term councillor had already earned the respect of the political, social and industrial establishments with her firm grasp of the booming city’s problems – especially its mounting debt load – and her no-nonsense approach in making the community’s case to extract a larger portion of the royalty revenues and tax dollars that flow south to Edmonton.

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Margaret Bateman

Margaret Bateman – Chair, Edmonton Regional Airports Authority

Flying below the radar has never hurt Margaret Bateman’s ability to get results. The beleaguered Edmonton Regional Airports Authority turned to Bateman to lead its board of directors in January 2004 due to her considerable image-making and management acumen. As the one-time managing director of the Alberta government’s Public Affairs Bureau, Bateman helped stickhandle several tricky issues for the Getty government, including the collapse of the Principal Group and the privatization of AGT. She left the public sector in 1990 to form Calder Bateman Communications, a high-powered Edmonton-based firm boasting an impressive client list.

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Cecile and Sandy Mactaggart

Cecile and Sandy Mactaggart – Philanthropists

Cecile, 66, and Sandy Mactaggart, 77, are celebrated for the exquisite gift the couple bestowed upon the University of Alberta.
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Larry Pollock

Larry Pollock – President and CEO, Canadian Western Bank

Even though Canadian Western Bank has posted 67 consecutive profitable quarters and 15 straight years of double-digit loan growth, CEO and president Larry Pollock does not rest on those laurels. The Edmonton-based bank, which operates 31 branches spread across Western Canada, expanded by purchasing Valiant Trust in April. The bank also snapped up Canadian Direct Insurance, which provides personal automobile and property insurance in Alberta and British Columbia, for $25.4 million from HSBC.

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Kit Chan

Kit Chan – Director, Bank of Canada

As one of 15 directors of the Bank of Canada, the federal keeper of the country’s currency, Kit Chan wields a lot of power. Since being appointed Alberta’s representative in 1999 by then Finance Minister Paul Martin, Chan has overseen the country’s monetary policies, rubber stamping how the central bank influences short-term interest rates, the -issuing of bank notes, and the operation of a safe, sound and efficient national monetary authority. She is an active spokesman for the bank, imparting the bank’s strategies to western and northern Canadian communities, as far north as Yellowknife and as far south as Medicine Hat.

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JR Shaw

JR Shaw – Chair, Calgary Campaign Alberta Heart Institute

After former deputy prime minister Don Mazankowski suffered a serious heart attack about 18 months ago that required major surgery, his good friend JR Shaw was spurred to action, raising more than $11 million for Edmonton’s new Alberta Heart Institute to be named after Mazankowski.

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Dr. Darla Zelenitsky

Dr. Darla Zelenitsky – Post Doctoral Fellow, Alberta Ingenuity Fund

When a female dinosaur skeleton was found in southeastern China and two shelled eggs were discovered lying side by side in its fossilized pelvis, University of Calgary’s Dr. Darla Zelenitsky was called in.
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Carol Ryder

Carol Ryder – Chair, Bow Valley College Board of Governors

Carol Ryder’s strong personal belief in lifelong learning and the accessibility and affordability of education make her an invaluable addition to Bow Valley College where she was appointed to chair the board of governors in June 2004.
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Alberta’s 50 Most Influentual People

Movers and shakers, inspirers and dealmakers. Ralph Klein topped the list. Find out who else shaped Alberta during the past 12 months.
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Vi Sunohara

Vi Sunohara – Director, Grande Prairie Chamber of Commerce
Governor, Grande Prairie Regional College
Influential Icon: Trailblazer

As a chemist who worked at El Dorado Nuclear but could not get a mortgage in 1961 because she was a woman, Vi Sunohara decided to do something about it and became one of the first female construction contractors.
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