Donald Galante is at his core a builder and fixer, from buildings to financial companies to communities. As a Little Silver Borough Councilman, he has played a pivotal role in creating a road paving rotation, building bathrooms in parks, preserving green space and negotiating to contain costs in services.  He also sits on the board of Monmouth County Crime Stoppers and chaired the Municipal Advisory Group for Monmouth County Board of Taxation.  Don previously sat on the Board of the Community YMCA. Donald is an active member of the Little Silver Fire Company.

“I have lived in Little Silver since 1986 with my wife of 40 years Mandy. We both believe in finding ways to contribute to our local community. I have sat on Council working for our town for a total of 23 years. Mandy sat on the school Board for 14 years and taught and built the Information Technology Academy at Red Bank Regional for the 18 years, Mandy was a founding member of the Mothers Center of Monmouth County and the original Technology Foundation of Little Silver. Our 3 children all grew up in Little Silver and attended our schools and Red Bank Regional High School. While our daughter lives in Seattle, we are blessed to have our sons and their wives living in Little Silver, raising our grandchildren in this wonderful town.”

Donald has a curiosity about how things work and fit together is what led him to Georgia Tech as an engineering major. After college Donald found that Wall Street offered an opportunity to merge his engineer’s attention to detail with his affinity for economics.

Over the course of 35 years Donald worked his way up from operations to trading and then management in the global fixed income markets. During his career he was instrumental in developing fixed income and brokerage units for Barclays, Citicorp, Dresdner Bank, Fuji Bank Ltd and MF Global.He most recently held the title of Global Chief Operating Officer and Chief Investment Officer for ED&F Man Capital Markets Inc. responsible for all operations and support functions as well as investing and managing the firm’s proprietary capital.

In addition to his financial expertise, Donald Galante is recognized for his support of colleagues and the financial industry community. At his Fuji Bank desk on 9/11 in the building across from 2 World Trade Center, Donald calmly fulfilled his Floor Marshal role to direct all employees to a safe evacuation. In the days, weeks and months to follow, Donald helped both his company and his colleagues to get back on their feet, assisting many in finding their balance after this devastating trauma.

Donald served on the Advisory Board for the Love School of Business at Elon University from 2005 to 2013. During this time, he helped design their mock training room, advised on the capital building program and facilitated internships for students at Wall Street firms.

Donald has worked with the “Raise Hope Foundation” to open career opportunities on Wall Street for disabled veterans. Donald created and taught two 16-week courses on the Introduction to Financial Markets at the Rutgers Newark campus.

Donald continues to advise fortune 500 companies and non-for-profit companies on global markets. Donald first served his community in the 1990s as a member of the Recreation committee and ran the soccer program for two years before joining the Council in 2000. In 2011 Donald gave up the commuting grind and directed his energy and skills towards helping the local community. 

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