Every 10 years, cities are required to review their charters—the rules that govern how they operate—and then ask voters to approve any changes. You’ll see 18 proposed charter amendments on your November ballot. The last three of that slate are causing heartburn for city officials and other local leaders.
All three, S, T, and U, are on the ballot because the nonprofit Dallas HERO collected enough signatures on petitions to get them there. Proposition S would require the city to waive its governmental immunity and would allow residents to sue the city if they felt it was not following the city charter, ordinances, or state law. Proposition T would require the city manager’s pay and continued employment to be based on the outcomes of a residential satisfaction survey. Both would tangle the city up in litigation and hamstring its search for a new city manager. (You can read more about all three amendments here.)
Proposition U has two elements. One would earmark at least 50 percent of new revenue each year for the police and fire pension system. It would also require that the additional funds go to increasing starting salaries for police officers. The other element requires that the city maintain a police force of at least 4,000 officers. As of this summer, Dallas has just shy of 3,100 officers. Police Chief Eddie García estimates that at current recruitment trends, it would take almost 15 years to hit the 4,000 mark. At its peak, in the mid-2010s, the department had around 3,600 officers. Just for the officers alone, the city estimates it would cost at least $175 million to hire, train, and outfit 900 additional cops.
And the list of new revenue sources touches nearly every aspect of city operations—including asset forfeiture revenue, property taxes, hotel occupancy taxes, court fees, open records fees, and public improvement district taxes.
But Proposition U has the potential to do the most harm to the city, thanks to two bills signed into law in 2021, in reaction to requests nationwide to reallocate police budgets to social services that were often referred to as “defunding” the police. House Bill 1900 levies a penalty on cities if they reduce their police spending unless there has also been a commensurate drop in revenue. Cities that reduce spending could see the state take part of its sales taxes (it would go to the Texas Department of Public Safety), and they would be banned from increasing property tax rates or utility rates. Senate Bill 23 requires cities to put any proposed decrease in police spending to a referendum.
If Proposition U were to pass, the earliest the city could amend the charter again is two years. This leads to an interesting hypothetical: what if residents voted to repeal the proposition in two years? Could the city reallocate those funds for city services, or would it then find itself punished by the state?
I asked state Sen. Nathan Johnson, who was present when the bills were debated in 2021.
“I mean, I’m not going to make a legal pronouncement, but it seems to me that it’s at least pretty likely that the city would be prosecuted and persecuted under that statute,” he said.
Johnson said when the bill was debated, many pointed out that it was unfair. A city’s policing needs can fluctuate. One council might dramatically increase a budget, but then over time, a city realizes that the population has shrunk, or crime has gone down, or they found more efficient ways of policing.
“Or some malevolent jackass comes in and manipulates the vote, causing you to increase your police force 550 percent in one fell swoop and wipe out the rest of the city’s budget,” he said. “And then you’re frozen. You can’t move.”
It would also likely require the city to have two separate elections on the matter, he said. One to amend the charter and then a later one to approve the reduction in spending.
When asked about the ramifications of HB 1900 on city budgets to come, council members Chad West, Gay Donnell Willis, and Adam Bazaldua all said it was just another example of how ill-conceived Dallas HERO’s propositions are.
“It’s far more complex, and I don’t think that many voters know that,” Willis said. The one-two punch of Proposition U and HB 1990, she says, will actually mean residents suffer. “It really gives voters less control over how their tax dollars get spent because we can’t reallocate that money for city services later if we needed to.”
Bazaldua says HERO’s claims that the Council is bent on defunding police are not substantiated by its actions. “Our priority has been doing right by public safety,” he said.
And all three council members were quick to point out that the City Council has not defunded the police. Public safety is 62 percent of the city’s general fund budget this year. Of the $1.2 billion bond package voters approved this year, $90 million goes to public safety facilities, with $50 million of that going toward a new police academy. The city plans to spend another $11.2 billion over the next 30 years to make the fire and police pension solvent.
“Public Safety remains a top priority for the City of Dallas,” Interim City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert said in a statement when she presented the budget to the Council. “The combined budget for the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire Rescue increased by $78 million to fulfill commitments made to our first responders.”
Bazaldua, Willis, and West all said that the police department was also one of the few allowed to hire more employees. (The city has budgeted for 250 additional officers next year.) Tolbert directed other city departments to cut their budgets by 6 percent. Hiring freezes or even staff reductions were implemented as part of that.
“The city budget is already lean,” West said. “There are only a few departments that fall into that category of not being absolutely necessary … and they’re a tiny percentage of the budget.”
Bazaldua agreed, adding that the city’s meet-and-confer agreement with the police and fire unions includes a 7 percent raise in January. “This fiscal year budget is very lean, and it became even leaner to maintain the city’s obligations from the fire and police meet-and-confer agreement,” he said. It also takes into account that the city will begin making its payments toward the police and fire pension in 2025.
He also questioned why Dallas HERO would leave firefighters out of the equation altogether. “It speaks volumes to the political nature of these amendments,” he said. “Firefighters respond to 911 calls and are absolutely just as critical as our police.”
The meet-and-confer contract allows the city to negotiate with both departments on things like pay raises and pay scales. It is popular with both unions, and it’s most recent contract was passed by 98 percent of their members. “I doubt we’ll be able to negotiate with both departments like we have been should U pass,” Bazaldua said. “We won’t have that flexibility, and we’ll be required … to treat the police department differently.”
Should Proposition U pass, the council members said, the things that make Dallas fun will go first. Libraries will close or see a reduction in hours. Funding for new parks would be limited, as would programming. “The arts programs will also go,” Bazaldua said.
Road maintenance will need to be cut. People could be asked to bring their garbage cans to the curb instead of the alley. “There would be no sacred cows,” Tolbert warned the Council in August.
Many of the programs that Dallas police Chief Eddie García points to as contributing to the reduction in violent crime could also be cut. “I tell constituents all the time that there are things on the budget that won’t be a line item under public safety, but are,” Willis said. That includes programs to help people find employment, affordable housing, and even recreational options. Those would be on the chopping block, she says, should the city be forced to suddenly budget for 900 more officers and reallocate half its new revenue.
“I’ve heard police officers tell me that nothing stops a bullet like a job,” she said. “Those programs are part of public safety.”
Dallas HERO executive director Pete Marocco calls the concerns about the budget “laughable.” In a statement to D Magazine in August, he said that the provision in the amendment that allocates new revenue was misunderstood. “The proportion verbatim states the plan comes from no more than 50 percent of new revenue,” he said. In fact, the amendment on file says the opposite.
While Marocco, who lives in the Park Cities, may find the concerns laughable, one thing is clear: city leaders do not find it so.
The real question will be whether voters see the humor or the alarm.
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