Leadership Bio

Denis P. Coleman! - President Pro-Tem, Town of Palm Beach and former Executive Vice President, The Bear Sterns Companies

Denis Patrick Coleman, 60, is a private investor, having been a senior Wall Street executive. He brings his experience and talent in finance and business to improve the public charities and civic organizations he supports in education, art, healthcare and family and children issues.

From 1986 until 1999, he served as board member and from 1993-1999 as Chairman of the Board of Covenant House, expanding the scope of this Catholic charity to serve and rescue over 60,000 street children a year in six countries and 21 cities with an operating budget in excess of $100,000,000. In 2000, Mr. Coleman received a MTS Degree, Summa cum Laude, from the John Paul II Institute for Studies in Marriage and Family.

A 1967 graduate, he was appointed in 2000 to the Board of Regents of Georgetown University, having served the University for over 11 years in senior advisory roles.

Mr. Coleman retired from the executive ranks of Wall Street as Vice-Chairman of Discount Corporation of New York in 1993 after he participated in the restructure and sale of the company.

For 22 years previously, 1967-1989, he was promoted to the most senior positions of the Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. He was Executive Vice-President and member of the firm’s Executive Committee and Board of Directors during one of the fastest growing and most volatile periods at that time in the world capital markets which included the “Crash of 1987.” At Bear Stearns, he was Chairman of the Operations Committee, the Credit Committee and head of the Fixed Income Division.

Mr. Coleman has served as a board member of the Norton Museum of Art, the Society of the Four Arts, the Community Foundation of Palm Beach and Martin County as well as a member of the Bishop’s Finance Council for the Diocese of Brooklyn. Between 2002 and 2004, Mr. Coleman served as the US Consul General to Bermuda. After his return from Bermuda in 2004, Mr. Coleman successfully ran for Town Council in Palm Beach and presently serves as the President of the Council. During the past 25 years, Mr. Coleman has been a board member of five prestigious private secondary educational institutions.