Bill Proenza

Bill Proenza
Born	New York
Alma mater	Florida State University
Occupation	meteorologist

Xavier William "Bill" Proenza was the Southern Region Director of the United States National Weather Service from 1999-2007 and 2007-2013. He was also previously the director of the National Hurricane Center (NHC) from January 4, 2007 to July 9, 2007.

Bill Proenza was born in New York, and raised in Florida. He graduated from Florida State University. He joined the National Hurricane Center in 1963 and 1964, becoming a reconnaissance meteorologist from 1965 through 1967. After working at the National Weather Service field offices in Huntsville, Alabama (1968), Columbus, Georgia (1969), and Atlanta, Georgia (1970), he headed for work at NWS headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland and Central Region headquarters before working for Southern Region headquarters in the late 1980s as deputy director, a position he served through the 1990s, before becoming its director in 1999. The Former NHC Director returned to the National Weather Service's Southern Region Headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas in Late September 2007.

Proenza had a rocky tenure as the chief of the NHC -- "a brief but turbulent tenure in which he publicly criticized his bosses and then lost the support of much of his staff."

In May 2007, he publicly accused NOAA of wasting money, specifically citing NOAA's plans to spend $4 million to publicize a 200th anniversary celebration while the agency has cut $700,000 from hurricane research. In its defense "NOAA spokesman Anson Franklin said the agency is actually only spending about $1.5 million on the campaign over two years. He said it is justified to publicize the agency's mission to a public that is often unaware of its involvement in weather prediction and forecasting."

Proenza had been particularly outspoken in his desire to see a replacement for the aging QuikSCAT satellite, which measures surface winds over remote ocean areas, citing a study that says "the center's ability to track storms could dip as much as 16 percent when the satellite dies."

Three senior researchers, however, complained that Proenza overstated his case, unduly alarming the public and compromising the center's credibility. Jeff Masters, former NOAA meteorologist and operator of Weather Underground, said Proenza relied on an imperfect, unpublished study. Masters pointed to a different, more complete study, which stated that QuickSCAT's loss would have at most a "minor effect". The criticism snowballed, and in early July, he faced an open revolt as half of the center's employees signed a letter calling for Proenza's departure. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel described the letter:

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