William Fulton is a Terner Center Fellow and a leading expert on land use and housing policy. He is a Professor of Practice at the University of California, San Diego Design Lab and Department of Urban Studies and Planning. Bill is the former Director of the Kinder Institute for Urban Research at Rice University, where he did extensive work highlighting the growing affordable housing problem in Houston.

Prior to his work at the Kinder Institute, Fulton served as Director of Planning and Economic Development for the City of San Diego, Vice President for Policy at the advocacy group Smart Growth America, Principal and Shareholder at the California urban planning firm now known as Placeworks, and Mayor of Ventura, California. 

Fulton is the author of six books, including Guide to California Planning, the standard urban planning textbook in California, and The Reluctant Metropolis: The Politics of Urban Growth in Los Angeles, which was an L.A. Times best-seller. He holds master’s degrees in mass communication from The American University and urban planning from the UCLA.