Williamson County candidate is Naval Intelligence veteran
William Kelberlau says he has mix of experience to serve as county sheriff.
Assigned to the Office of Naval Intelligence, William Kelberlau worked with embassies at the end of the Vietnam War and later with the Drug Enforcement Administration in Central America. He has also been a production and training manager for Texas Instruments, a computer company.
Now he wants to be the next sheriff of Williamson County.
“I feel I have a unique set of qualifications and experiences and achievements that will improve the performance of the sheriff ’s office,” said Kelberlau. The 66-year-old has never before run for political office.
Williamson County’s current sheriff, James Wilson, has decided not to run again and has endorsed Sheriff ’s Lt. Mike Cowie. Cowie and Kelberlau are the only two candidates who have announced they will run in the Republican primary in March. Kelberlau said he would not discuss the issues in the sheriff ’s campaign until the filing period for the candidates is over. Filing begins Nov. 14 and ends Dec. 14.
“Right now I am just talking about my background,” he said. He said he is running to make sure his grandchildren “have the same liberties and freedoms we grew up with as defined in the Constitution.”
“A lot of people don’t understand how important the sheriff ’s office is,” he said. “You have to get into the Texas Constitution and Texas statutes to fully understand the breadth and width of the sheriff ’s office.”
Kelberlau, who retired in 2009, grew up in McAllen and has a master’s degree from Southern Methodist University in engineering management. He is married and has two daughters and also grandchildren.
He said he spent his 30-year career with the Navy — on active duty and the reserves — in the intelligence unit. At the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, he said, he did an “evaluation of embassies in Cambodia and Vietnam.”
In 1991 he worked with mobilizing forces for Desert Shield and in 1992 he helped start a tactical unit with the DEA in Panama “chasing major drug cartels,” he said. He retired as a captain in the U.S. Navy in 2001.
Kelberlau said he spent 28 years working in management for Texas Instruments and then for Raytheon, which bought the defense part of Texas Instruments’ business in 1997.