Dani Gasparini

Owner, GB Consulting

Born and raised in Redwood City, Dani is proud to say she is a product of the local Redwood City, public education, and CSU education systems.

Dani has focused much of her career in Redwood City/San Mateo County. She began her ten-year career with the YMCA then moved directly into nearly a decade in banking as the Vice President of Bay Area Bank in Redwood City. In the middle of her YMCA and banking career, Dani was elected to the Redwood City Council at just twenty-nine years old and became Mayor of the City two years later. She was the top vote-getter in her election cycle and the number of votes she received still remains the highest number of votes to today.

While working at Bay Area Bank and sitting on the Redwood City Council, Dani was appointed to the Chamber San Mateo County Board of Directors and became Chairperson.  Dani still remains active as a member of the Past Chair’s Council.

Dani considers herself a YES person…so when Sequoia Hospital in Redwood City asked her to help raise the capital dollars necessary to build the new hospital pavilion she said YES. Dani spent the next several years raising money for the Sequoia Hospital Foundation. Dani immediately realized her passion for healthcare after meeting Bonnie Addario where Dani then became the Executive Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation. Dani helped the organization raise critical dollars and build financial development and capacity strategies to ensure organizational sustainability as the organization moved from a local, founder-based, non-profit to a global force in lung cancer.

Today, Dani has taken on the role of consultant and is working with non-profit organizations to build capacity, organizational structure, and policy. Just completing a contract with the Healthcare Foundation of Northern Sonoma County she now finds herself working with community leaders and the San Mateo County Sheriff’s office, the Sheriff’s Activity League and has lead Board Leadership training and strategic planning sessions for many non-profit organizations. You might also find her at the planning counter in East Palo Alto as a development consultant for a small housing project, or you might find her tending their family vineyard in Healdsburg CA.

Dani’s list of community recognitions include The Sequoia Award Citizen of the Year, The Redwood City/San Mateo County Chamber Person of the Year and Business Woman of the Year, was inducted into the San Mateo County Woman’s Hall of Fame, the Kennedy Middle School Hall of Fame and the Woodside High School Community Hall of Fame.

If you were to ask Dani what she is most proud of, she will say her family and her community…and most especially proud of her Mom and Dad for their courage to come to the U.S. in 1948.