Ward 3 Councilor candidate Bill Hanley

It’s the end of Bill Hanley’s first two-year term serving as the councilor for Ward 3, but the Waltham native has lived here his whole life. Hanley said his family moved around the city growing up – from Lakeview, the Highlands and a few neighborhoods in Ward 3.

He attended college in Indiana but realized the Midwest wasn’t for him.

“I’m not someone who denies being a townie, I’ve always loved Waltham,” Hanley said. “You get a city life and a suburban life, and that’s something I really love about the city.”

Hanley said he convinced his wife Kristie to move from Dedham and call Waltham home as well. The pair initially rented an apartment on the South Side and moved to Piety Corner in 2002. Hanley, his wife and their two sons moved to their current home off Trapelo Road in 2020.

After college Hanley began his career in healthcare information technology at Mass General Brigham, where he is now the IT manager. He cited the opportunities for young families in education, housing and community involvement that Waltham offers as reasons he settled here as an adult. He said those opportunities are still important draws today.

“The opportunities for success were all there if you went after them, now that my kids are in college and coming out of college, I’m seeing those opportunities are still there if you’re willing to work for them,” Hanley said. “I don’t know if you can necessarily get all that stuff in one small city somewhere else.”

Hanley is no stranger to community involvement. Before becoming a member of the City Council, he served on the city’s Board of Health for 18 years. Today he’s involved with the Waltham Education and Beyond Foundation, Waltham Land Trust, Waltham Triad Lodge, Waltham Museum and Waltham Lions Club.

Both of Hanley’s sons are graduates of Waltham High School, and Hanley has held a variety of school-related volunteer positions as well served as a liaison to the School Building Committee and member of the Waltham High School principal screening committee, WHS class of 2022 parent advisory board and Waltham schools technology advisory council.

When his sons were young, Hanley said he got involved through sports, coaching baseball, basketball and soccer as well as serving as president of Waltham Youth Baseball for 10 years.

As Hanley’s sons were finishing up their time at WHS and moving off to college, Hanley said he wanted to get involved in local government and be part of decision-making in the city.

“Every week in Waltham brings a new problem to solve or a new victory, and I really love that about being on City Council,” Hanley said.

In his two years representing Ward 3, Hanley said he’s especially proud of the work that has been done to restore 50 acres of wetlands at the Fernald Property at 200 Trapelo Road.

“I can’t think of a single example of that anywhere else,” Hanley said. “It usually goes the opposite way, building on top of green space and wetlands and we did the opposite.”

Older roads and private ways pose traffic safety challenges in Ward 3, he said. Drivers speed down the newly repaved Silver Hill Lane as a cut-through to avoid construction on Lexington Street. Slowing people down, Hanley said, is difficult, but he said he is constantly working on solutions, citing a speed study he recently had done.

The completion of construction on Lexington Street, Hanley said he thinks will bring some relief.

Hanley also listed public safety as a priority and said keeping residents safe depends on making sure first responders are well-equipped to assist. Hanley said he will continue to advocate for new police and fire facilities to make sure both departments have their needs met. Upgrades to both facilities, he said, have been a long time coming.

Additionally, he said modernizing city communications would help increase government transparency and accessibility of information for residents. Hanley mentioned providing a residential services mobile app and updates to city websites as solutions.

Hanley said that as a member of the City Council’s Ordinances and Rules Committee, he is actively involved in rezoning and updates in collaboration with the city’s consultant. He noted that Waltham is unique in its zoning, with two universities, a variety of residential areas and commercial districts, so finding balance and preserving single-family neighborhoods is a challenge.

“One thing we have to look at is how we’re going to balance multi-unit housing, single-family neighborhoods and commercial districts,” Hanley said. “I’m starting to see that at the state and even national level those are all now being mixed together, and I can’t say I’m a fan of that.”

Having both urban and suburban life in one city is what Hanley said convinced him and his wife to start their family in Waltham.

“You can walk up and down Moody Street in the evening and then the next day go hiking in Prospect Hill; you get the best of both worlds,” Hanley said.

Hanley is running unopposed for his second term as Ward 3 councilor.