With Airdrie’s former Chief Administrative Officer, Paul Schulz, retiring, city council had to find a new one, and it’s safe to say Horacio Galanti fits the job. 

Galanti’s moved himself and his two Yorkies from Grand Prairie to Airdrie to work for the city. 

“I've been in Airdrie for about three weeks, two and a half weeks since I kind of have officially moved here. My interactions with council, with city staff and with the community in general, have been fantastic.” 

Galanti, who was originally from Argentina started out as a civil Engineer, but wanted to test the waters in local government because, as he sees it, it is the first layer where we really have the opportunity to connect with residents and to make positive changes.” 

In 2004, Galanti got his first job in Canada working in traffic management in Vancouver. From there, Galanti moved to Fort St. John as Vancouver has too much rain. In Fort St. John he worked for the city as the director of Planning and Engineering for about seven years. 

Galanti made the move to the private sector just for a different change of pace before moving to Grand Prairie and getting back into local government and working with the city for quite a few years.  

Galanti, who is an avid mountaineer has climbed the largest mountains in all seven continents, the north and south poles. He also climbed Mount Everest twice from both faces via Nepal and Tibet.  

GlantiGalanti climbing Lhotse Face on Everest: Climbing on steep ice towards Camp 4 on Everest, at 7,800 mts a.s.l in a wind storm.

“In 2019, just before the pandemic, we were lucky enough to go there in 2019. We went to China, and we climbed the north face in Tibet, which was quite an adventure, very cold, and very windy.” 

GalantiGalanti on Everest Summit – At 8,850 m a.s.l. Horacio standing on the summit of Everest

Now settling down in Airdrie, Galanti says his new home is a fantastic place to be. 

“It is a very dynamic city and it is growing very rapidly. The variety of opportunities here at work, in my position as city manager in terms of coordination, helping, resourcing, removing obstacles, and working together with council, the rest of the staff and the community is very unique.” 

With Galanti just starting, he does have some items on his agenda he wants to get done. 

“What I'm doing right now is doing a little bit of an observation period, listening, observing how the city of Airdrie is operating. It's a big organization with a 200-million-dollar operating budget with 600 staff or so. It will take some time, just to observe and analyze how the corporation operates.” 

Galanti says he also plans on focusing on the 2023 budget as budget deliberations are coming up in November. 

One thing Galanti is most excited about is being so close to Kananaskis Country. 

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