Bill Williams announces a run for Loganville City Council

Bill Williams is no stranger to public service.

He spent a decade as an U.S. Air Force security police officer, 25 years as a paramedic and five years as a 911 emergency dispatcher.

Now Williams is looking to add elected official to that list as he officially declared his candidacy Aug. 7 for Loganville City Council.

Williams has lived in Loganville for the past five years with his wife, Debbie, and her parents Karen and Tom. He has also been a member of the Loganville City Planning and Development Commission for the last year. He is currently employed with the Georgia Department of Transportation in traffic safety management. “I believe with my background I will be able to help the city in several areas,” Williams said.

Some areas he would like to help implement include developing a rapid medical response fire vehicle program.

“Currently large fire equipment is utilized to respond to simple medical emergencies,” he said. “These are very expensive pieces of equipment, and these calls don’t require all the firefighting equipment that this equipment carries. Walton County Fire currently responds with a much smaller agile pickup style vehicle. This would reduce the mileage and wear and tear on these fire engines and ladder trucks.”

Williams would also like to consider a community police model for the city.

“Each section of the city should have a community police representative assigned,” he said. “We occasionally have concerns in our neighborhood and it would be nice to have someone in the police department that we could contact to speak with.”

Further redevelopment of the downtown district of Loganville is also vital.

“Every time the city has an outdoor concert, there is a large crowd in the outdoor area,” Williams said. “We need to figure out how to get these people in the downtown area more frequently. These crowds would provide a return on investment for current and future merchants. Loganville’s downtown is being left behind as other communities develop their downtown. But we don’t want to be like everyone else
with large condos and big buildings. We want a quaint pedestrian friendly downtown experience.”

The Loganville City Council is not separated into districts. All candidates run for one of the available seats each election. Williams said he is in the process of setting up a website for his campaign. Once live, voters can view it at Billw4loganville.com