An entrepreneur, nonprofit executive, corporate executive, attorney and teacher, Bill joined EAC in 2018. He also serves as the vice president for civic engagement and external relations at Duquesne University. In this role, he facilitates and develops relationships with local and national community organizations, governments, and civic organizations, and oversees the university’s government affairs.

Bill most recently served as the inaugural president and CEO of Urban Innovation21, a regional public-private economic development partnership that links successful innovation economy clusters with the needs and assets of underserved, inner city communities to produce local, living and sustainable economies. He has a lifelong commitment to rectifying America’s embedded structural inequalities of wealth aggregation, mobility and opportunity, and in this capacity is among the co-founders of the 1worker1vote movement.

Bill holds a bachelor’s degree from Morehouse College, a law degree from Emory University, and is licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania and Georgia. He serves on several nonprofit boards and advisory committees, including The Pittsburgh Foundation, the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, Pittsburgh Mercy Health Systems, Pittsburgh Economic and Industrial Development Corporation, Innovation Works, The Heinz Endowments African American Male Initiative, and the Business Advisory Council of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.

In 2014, Bill was appointed to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. In 2016, he was selected as a BALLE (Business Alliance for Local Living Economies) fellow. In 2017, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Carlow University, and in 2018, he was appointed to the Benjamin Franklin Technology Development Authority Board.