The New York Public Library Board of Trustees Leadership

Color headshot of Abby S. Milstein. Abby S. Milstein, Chair of the Board

Abby S. Milstein is a founding partner in the Iaw firm of Constantine Cannon, LLP. She is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard University (Radcliffe), where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School.

Formerly, Abby was an Assistant Commissioner of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs and subsequently Director of Legal Writing and Moot Court at Benjamin N. Cardozo Law School, where she was an adjunct professor.

Abby has been Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the New York Public Library and Chair of the Executive Committee of the Board for 8 years. She has served on many other Library committees in her more than 2 decades on the Board. For 15 years, she chaired or co-chaired the Library's Literary Luncheon. She was Co-Chair of the New York State Regents Commission on Library Services and has served as a member of the Cornell University Library Council. She is an inaugural member of the Cambridge University Library Advisory Committee.

For 18 years Abby was Chair of the Board of the New York Legal Assistance Group. She has also served as a Trustee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York Fund, Inc. and has been Secretary and Chair of the Bar Association's Committee on Legal Education and Admission to the Bar. She chaired the Governor's Judicial Selection Committee for the 1st Judicial Department of New York. She was an inaugural member of the Poverty Justice Advisory Board.

Abby has served for many years on the Dean's Advisory Board of the Harvard Law School. Also at Harvard, Abby was a member of the Law School Visiting Committee and the Visiting Committee for the University Libraries. She has been a Harvard University Schools Committee interviewer and is a member of the Harvard Committee on University Resources.

Abby sits on the Board of Bryant Park. For 13 years she was a Commissioner on the New York City Public Design Commission. She was a Trustee at the National Humanities Center and a member of the Cornell University Arts and Sciences Advisory Council.

She is a former Trustee of Riverdale Country School, The Museum of the City of New York, The Jewish Museum, and the Associated YM&YWHAs of New York. At the American Jewish Committee, she is a member of the Women's Campaign Board and sat on the National Leadership Council.

Abby S. Milstein is married to Howard P. Milstein and they have a son, Michael.

 

Color headshot of Ray McGuire. Raymond J. McGuire, Vice Chair of the Board

With a career spanning nearly four decades, Raymond J. McGuire has distinguished himself as a leader in the financial world as well as a philanthropist with a deep commitment to giving back and giving opportunity.

In 2020, Mr. McGuire left his role as Vice Chairman of Citigroup and Chairman of Citi’s Banking, Capital Markets and Advisory business to pursue public service. While at Citi, Mr. McGuire held a 13-year term as Citi’s Global Head of Corporate and Investment Banking, the longest tenure for this position in the history of Wall Street.

Under his leadership, Citi leveraged its unmatched global network to meet multinational and sovereign clients’ working capital, debt and equity capital raising and strategic Mergers & Acquisitions needs. Mr. McGuire has personally advised on transactions across global industries and geographies valued at $700 billion+, including Time Warner/AT&T (the fifth largest transaction in history).

Prior to joining Citi, Mr. McGuire was the Global Co-Head of Mergers & Acquisitions at Morgan Stanley; Managing Director in the Mergers and Acquisitions Group of Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.; and one of the original members of Wasserstein Perella & Co., Inc. where he became a Partner/Managing Director in 1991. He started his career in 1984 in the Mergers & Acquisitions Group of The First Boston Corporation.

Mr. McGuire has demonstrated a long-standing commitment to cultural and education institutions. Presently, he serves as a Board member of numerous boards including: the American Museum of Natural History (Executive Committee and Chair Nominating Committee), the Citi Foundation, the De La Salle Academy (Chairman Emeritus), the Greentree Foundation, the Hotchkiss School (Vice President), the New York City Police Foundation, the New York-Presbyterian Hospital, the New York Public Library (Executive Committee and Co-Chairman Nominating Committee), the Skadden Foundation, the Studio Museum in Harlem (Chairman), the Terra Foundation for American Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art (Executive Committee). Mr. McGuire is also a member of the Cultural Affairs Advisory Commission for the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. He has previously served on the boards of the Alex Hillman Family Foundation, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, FAPE (Foundation for Art and Preservation in Embassies), the Harvard Club of New York, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the International Center of Photography (President), the Joseph & Claire Flom Foundation, Lincoln Center and the San Remo Tenants’ Corporation (President). Formerly, he was a Director of the Wyeth Corporation (Nominating & Governance Committee). He has also served on various Visiting Committees at Harvard University, as well as the Overseers/Directors Nominating Committee.

Through his dedication to mentoring, Mr. McGuire has not only mentored hundreds of individuals, but he has also served on advisory boards for the Council of Urban Professionals, Sponsors for Educational Opportunities and Management Leadership for Tomorrow.

Mr. McGuire has received numerous honors and distinctions including the Theodore Roosevelt Award from the Legal Aid Society, the John C. Whitehead Social Enterprise Award from the Harvard Business School Club NY, the Public Service Award from Big Brothers, Big Sisters, the Trailblazer Award from the MBBA, the Humanitarian Leadership Award from CUP (“Council of Urban Professionals”) and the Frederick Douglas Award from the New York Urban League. He was also recognized by New York’s Avenue Magazine as one of New York’s “50 Smartest” and by Crain’s as one of the “Most Connected New Yorkers”. ARTnews includes Mr. McGuire on its list of the world’s “Top 200 Collectors”. He was inducted by Morehouse College as one of the inaugural members of the Martin Luther King, Jr. International Board of Renaissance Leaders. He was also featured in Black Enterprise Magazine as one of the “100 Most Powerful Executives in Corporate America” and on the cover of Black Enterprise Magazine as one of the most powerful Blacks on Wall Street.

Mr. McGuire has been honored by New York Needs You, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Studio in a School and the National CARES Mentoring Movement. He has also served as Corporate Chair for the 2016 Howard University Charter Day. Pratt Institute honored him as its inaugural distinguished “Patron of the Arts”. Mr. McGuire has also been honored with Harvard Business School’s African American Student Union’s Professional Achievement Award, has presented at Harvard Law School’s Traphagen Distinguished Alumni Speaker Series and emceed the first Harvard College Black Alumni Weekend.

He received his M.B.A. and J.D. from Harvard Business School and Harvard Law School (1984), and an A.B., cum laude, from Harvard College (1979). He also attended the University of Nice, France while on a Rotary Fellowship (1980). He has had legal experience at the law firms of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom as well as Patterson, Belknap, Webb & Tyler.

He received a L.H.D. from Pratt Institute (2011) and a L.H.D from Dominican College (2017).

Mr. McGuire resides in New York City with his wife, Crystal McCrary McGuire. Together they are raising three children.