William N. "Billy" Hall, Jr.

William N. "Billy" Hall, Jr. (August 20, 1940 - February 19, 2002), was a Democratic member of the Texas House of Representatives from 1973-1987 and, prior to his Death in office, the elected Webb County treasurer. Ray Keck, III, president of Texas A&M International University in Laredo, the seat of Webb County, described his friend Hall as part of a diverse mix of south Texas culture: "He found in politics a forum to express his irrepressible love of people."

Hall served in the state House under the administrations of Governors Dolph Briscoe, Bill Clements (first term), and Mark White. He did not seek an eighth two-year term in 1986. Instead, he ran in the Democratic primary for the Texas State Senate, having lost the nomination to Judith Zaffirini, a Laredo educator and businesswoman, who in turn won the seat in the general election over the Republican Jeff Wentworth of San Antonio. Zaffirini still holds the seat and is a legislative spokesperson on matters of health care and education. Hall's former state House seat first reverted to current U.S. Representative Henry Cuellar and then in 2001 to Richard Raymond, both Democrats.

In the legislature, Hall was a strong advocate of the former Laredo State University (established 1970), the forerunner to TAMIU, located on a new campus off the Bob Bullock Expressway in east Laredo. Mercurio Martinez, Jr., a former Webb County administrative judge and a longstanding member of the Laredo Community College board of trustees, said that Hall skillfully planted the seeds of the future TAMIU. Representative Hall was a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, chaired the Law Enforcement and Liquor Regulation committees, and served on the Revenue and Taxation Committee.

Hall graduated from Martin High School, where he was a football player. He was the former publisher of the South Texas Citizen, a newspaper started by his father, William Hall, Sr. (1912-1976). Hall, Jr., thereafter sold the paper to a businessman in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. A former teacher, Hall was later an officer with the International Bank of Commerce owned by former gubernatorial candidate Tony Sanchez of Laredo. Republican Governor Clements named Hall in 1987 to the National Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission.

Hall was known too for his personal generosity. For years, he played Santa Claus for Head Start children. He was particularly accommodating to waiters and waitresses. He served on the Central Texas Make-a-Wish Foundation board of directors, an organization that attempts to provide last requests of terminally-ill children. At various times, he was president of the Laredo Boys Club and Girls Club, the Washington Birthday Association, the Border Olympics, and the Salvation Army. He formerly chaired the Laredo Community College Citizen Advisory Committee, a panel since disbanded. He was Roman Catholic.

In January 1995, Hall was appointed Webb County treasurer by the commissioners court after Mike Urdiales resigned to become a member of the county commission. Hall was then elected to a full term in 1998. He died of cancer during The Primary campaign of 2002, when he was a candidate for a second term. The nomination for treasurer went to Delia Perales, who in the general election defeated Laredo businessman Joe Guerra, a former member of the Laredo City Council and one of the few Republicans ever even to seek county office in heavily Democratic Webb County. Perales won again in 2006. Hall's great-grandfather was also a Webb County treasurer.

In 2007, the Webb County Commissioners Court named the county administrative building after Hall. There is a bronze bust of Hall in the lobby of the building. Hall is also honored through the William N. "Billy" Hall Student Center on the Laredo Community College South Campus, located off U.S. Highway 83 in southeastern Laredo. Ironically, Hall's old intraparty rival Zaffirini is honored on the same campus by the naming of the library.

Hall's survivors included his wife, the former Annabelle Uribe (born 1947), and a son, William Hall, III.