BILL FAQ's

What or who is a Herculean star? I found myself as a young senior manager living in my home town and a chance meeting with the Mayor led to me being awarded a gold star for my contribution to the city which positively impacted the people of that city. She had shared with me a problem she was encountering with adoption of new city initiative and having a background in driving adoption of new business process and principles I offered my help through my expertise and time. It turns out it had a big impact for both of us. While the task wasn't effortless, it was easy to accomplish given I had the expertise to communicate and implement it. This brought us together on several other efforts one of which included uncovering a predatory towing scheme that was negatively impacting both residents and visitors alike, which led to an advanced technology led parking solution. I enjoyed seeing her guide the city and the inhabitants through good and tough times. I was privileged to have had her as a excellent example of governance and to be a part of her inner circle. She had a vision and a plan to execute it and that made a direct impact on me as to how important leadership is and how to effectively attain those goals in an elected position.

Who is William "Bill" Henderson? ​Bill has accumulated a vast amount of skills and experiences with which to draw from to help Hercules meet the challenge of the next 152 years. One of Bill's governing principles is Occam's Razor: "other things being equal, a simpler explanation is better than a more complex one." Those who know him especially well will attest that there is another principle that defines Bill: the principle of "anything for a story." As a lifelong sailor and commercially licensed captain, Bill is adamant that you can never know enough to not be taught a new lesson, especially when the forces of nature and mankind are involved. His experience and business knowledge are very much akin to his love of sailing—likewise to how he's never met a boat that wasn't worth his time, from 19th-century Schooners to 100-ton passenger vessels plying the waters on the Eastern and Western seaboard and the San Francisco and New York harbors, he's never encountered a situation or business that he couldn't find any ability to add out-sized value to.​ It goes without saying that anyone who resists change or is unable to learn is ignoring within themselves the very things they oppose in their organization or business. On the contrary, a drive for continuous improvement and learning, as well as the precept of Kaizen "Change for the Better," are all ingrained in Bill's DNA. As such, he is determined to help every constituent, organization and or company identify this ethos and employ it to their advantage. Bill had been pursuing Masters in Economics before realizing the incredible pace of technology and its impact on government and businesses which is now measured in dog years, meant by the time he finished technology will have moved on. Thus an MBA was acquired from real world experience. Bill was especially enamored with the requisite technology at the time, as well as its incredible evolution, starting from PC based technology to the Internet mainframe to mobile computing. ​Always the one in the group to find the conventionally accepted limit first, Bill is consistently pushing the envelope. After all, anything worth doing is worth doing well in an aggressive, lean forward way. Granted it can make many uncomfortable but when you are as focused on achieving good outcomes the benefit overshadows the process. This way of moving forward provided a useful core competency in risk and change management. As you learn how to defy conventional wisdom, you begin to recognize on your own when things are likely to break and how; you learn to either hold back at that instance or push ahead. Experience in the alternative investment, trading, currency markets,  and structured products (such as ABS issuance) spaces made Bill aware of downside risk and the benefit of embracing it as an opportunity to enhance the upside of your portfolio. Fundamentally, one should go with whatever nature dealt them. And when that's not working, draft it towards a new outcome. ​Bill brings to Hercules his personal vision of bringing out the significant value that many opportunities have but, for some reason, can’t evolve to value expansion.  Bill has consistently worked closely with some of the brightest entrepreneurial, business and technical minds and most innovative Internet and Enterprise technology solutions, in Alternative Investment and Financial Engineering, Automotive Manufacturing and Retail, Banking (Global Cash Management), Finance (Investment / Debt / Trading), e-Procurement, Supply Chain and Logistics Management, Defense and Aerospace - Sensors, and Homeland Security and Combating Global Terrorism. With the common linkage within each industry representing groundbreaking software development, Bill's immersive nature enables him to get up to speed quickly. The breadth and depth of his experience help elevate the constituents, residents, property and business owners and up and coming global companies and enable them to grow past their early successes.

What is Bill's family like? We have a blended family of two boys and two girls the oldest being 29 and the youngest being 13. We are also mixed with our household and extended family being Asian, Black and White. Snow is a Navy Mom, as her oldest is currently in his second tour and based in DC. The second oldest lives with us at home, and the oldest daughter lives and works on the East Coast in NYC. I was born in NYC and grew up in a community much like Hercules when my parents left NYC in the mid-seventies. Snow emigrated from China when she was twelve, when her father despite being raised in China was an American citizen. Snow and I met in NYC and relocated back to her home state and settled here in Hercules in 2018. We are both thrilled to be here in Hercules, and certainly to call this our home. Snow is very active in the community with the Buy Nothing Group on FaceBook and she loves baskets.

I want to be a star for Bill! I am so excited to have made the decision to run, but I have to admit it was at the deadline when I decided for sure, so I don't have the team I'd like to at this time, but I will have a team, and with that being said I can use more help. I am starting a grass roots campaign to introduce myself and present my qualifications and to gather your attaboys or concerns about your needs or that of your street, neighborhood or community. I hope to have substantive discussions with residents, citizens, property and business owners and corporate citizens. There are 49 distinct and separate neighborhoods, and I count the property and business owners in Hercules as the 50th special interest group. It's not lost on me that there are fifty stars. I hope to recruit stars that can work on my campaign and transition to a star role when I am elected to city council.

I'm a Herculean resident. How can I meet Bill? You can call me at 510-939-0558, or send an email to bill4hercules@gmail.com or make an appointment on my calendar which I hope to have published on the website by the 1st week in September. I will limit the discussion to 15 minutes, but if I have time we can go longer. I just have manage my time to make sure I get to meet with as many folks as possible.

I'm a Herculean business owner. How can I meet Bill? You can call me at 510-939-0558, or send an email to bill4hercules@gmail.com or make an appointment on my calendar which I hope to have published on the website by the 1st week in September. I will limit the discussion to 60 minutes, but if I have time we can go longer. I just have manage my time to make sure I get to meet with as many folks as possible.

We are a Herculean HOA. How can we meet Bill? You don't have to be organized as an HOA if you are just a group of like minded neighboors, I am happy to meet with you as well. Figure out a host and have that host coordinate with me on how we can make it happen. You can call me at 510-939-0558, or send an email to bill4hercules@gmail.com or make an appointment on my calendar which I hope to have published on the website by the 2nd week in September. I will limit the discussion to 90 minutes, but if I have time we can go longer. I just have manage my time to make sure I get to meet with as many folks as possible.

What has Bill done for Hercules? My direct involvment in the Hercules community really started in the spring of 2020 with the backdrop of the first wave of COVID and the George Floyd movement and #BLM. I felt that with my background and perspective that I had something to add to the equation. However I was disappointed that the discussions were too reactionary and harmful. Specifically regarding the movement to defunding the police department. I did not see that as a solution, as having lived in rough neighborhoods and seen first hand the senseless violence that can take place in neighborhoods generally the police are the one hope that many residents can rely on. We see how harmful and misguided this initiative was with immediate effect. Yes police brutality and singling out any particular race for societal issues is wrong, but I view it as more the exception than the rule. Although I was a early adopter of local efforts like PHREED, there were distinct differences in how we could achieve the same goals. When a neighbor in Pinole-- David "Pat" Underwood-- was killed I was incensed that the local community organization focused on equity and diversity largely ignored his funeral, as did the local media. Pat was local hero and an exemplary person we would have all been proud to call our friend and neighbor. I took my angst and channeled it into the founding of www.herculespc.com, or the Hercules Constitution Free Press. Which was conceived on Juneteenth, 2020 and was launched on the 4th of July of that year. I felt the loss of the community newspaper due to the viability of the economics played a hand in the change in discourse within the community. The role of the community newspaper was supposed  to be covered by social media, but social media venues like NextDoor and Facebook have their advantages when it come to detailing and having a debate on complex and heated issues in the community we quickly can see the disadvantages. I find it frustrating that key issues get debated and discussed at length and then get deleted as it doesnt meet the corporate sponsor's threshold for commercial viability. When the records get deleted and we can relive the errors of the past we are doomed to relive those errors. With that issue in mind I recruited a well represented group of residents within Hercules, and we set about building out local newsource and forum for public discourse, a town square where just the residents could weigh in and add to many complex issues that faced us here in Hercules and adjacent cities in West Contra Costa County. I am proud of what we built and we contrbuted and added to the big discussions regaring the local 2020 elections, and later to the dangerous, strong arm tactics and mis-guided effort to annex the Rodeo-Hercules Fire District. It was through this effort that I discovered that the Contra Costa County and ConFire had taken over the County Ambulance Program and had effectively raised the prices by 250%. Just another example of county overreach. It's a complicated issue and very disturbing as to how a key service we depend on for our very lives is being weaponized to hurt all of its citizens. In just a few short weeks I was able to utilize my forensic accounting expertise from banking to follow the budgets and the money trail in both the state, county and local fire district budget. This was all synthesized in a presentation that was delivered by the outgoing Measure O committee Chairman and is a part of the public record as it was recorded and is available on the www.rhfd.org website. We then turned our focus on the strategic plan. Each year the Rodeo Hercules Fire District is to complete 1/5 of a strategic plan which is to be updated every five years. The last one was completed in 2012. It is 2022, 10 years have elapsed and for ten years the strategic plan was not being updated. 2019 and even up until now the strategic plan was functionally obsolete covering planned acquisition of fire fighter equipment, radios, technology like drones, manpower training, hiring all were not being addressed. Now we have heard all of these problems which have manifested from not having a strategic plan for ten years and this has been laid at the feet of the civilian board, but we have had three fire professionals who have been half of the board who in their own jobs have a plan for everything in their own Fire Districts. This does not make any sense, unless you understand the big picture. The independence of Hercules is under constant pressure from those who would benefit from an UN-Incorporated City, albeit a financially bereft city. Which brings me to the last and most recent issue. That is of the movement to abolish Hercules as a General Law City and to adopt a Charter City structure so that the ability to create local taxes on ourselves would be vested into the local government. The tax proposed was a Transfer Tax which exists already, but it would be increased by 10-16x the current tax which would be approximately $9-14k for a $850k home in Hercules. For any family that made an investment and paid their taxes and were lucky enough to realize a windfall in their investment, they need not be penalized and prepay one year and half of taxes. Especially when the incoming homeowner will be paying a substantial amount and most likley paying the tax double that to the finance or baning company. To even suggest these arbitrary and mis-guided solutions just shows a lack of imagination, and the fact so much time was spent on it without much work to show for just boggles the mind. This was literally the tipping point for me the one thing that spurred me to run for Hercules City Council. The pattern of complacency, issue avoidance and and lack of leadership is jeopardizing our future of the next 152 years. Add to that the Contra Costa County as a stakeholder to benefit greatly should Hercules fail to stay independent makes the County an entity not incented to work fully on our behalf. Let's face it we are only small fraction of the votes in the CCC our interests will never be a priority or served well. the only way to maintain a vibrant and effective city is to remain fiercely independent and strong financially, hence my platform. We can't have a steady diet of Retail stores and residential homes and rely on sales taxes and increaseing property taxes, we need to grow on protein and commercial business development and we need to do so with a sense of urgency and aplomb.