Council Members Paula Blackmon and Gay Donnell Willis appeared to engage in some fearmongering during a Dallas City Council discussion over a charter amendment proposition that, if approved by voters, would increase the number of officers fielded by the Dallas Police Department.
The proposition in question was one put forward by the nonprofit Dallas HERO, which got enough signatures from residents to put the measure on the ballot. Petition signatories registered their support for an amendment to the Dallas City Charter that would make DPD pay competitive, require the City to maintain at least 4,000 peace officers, and compel officials to shore up the Dallas Police and Fire Pension System.
Only around 3,000 officers are currently in the field, despite a prior City analysis advising that a force of roughly 4,000 is needed to properly police a jurisdiction the size of Dallas.
Meanwhile, the Dallas City Council approved a budget of only $654 million for DPD this fiscal year, which is considerably less taxpayer money than police departments are budgeted in other high-crime cities, such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City.
Willis (District 13) appeared hostile to the notion of quickly raising DPD’s force to 4,000.
“You know, that [charter amendment] really flies all over me because you don’t order Dallas police officers off of Amazon. … It also diminishes the creative initiatives that have been worked on over the past few years that are working in terms of retention and recruitment. … I think that going about it this way really devalues our police officers. You know, I’m really concerned by the remarks I heard at the lectern [from Pete Marocco of Dallas HERO] about equating the best police officers to money,” Willis said.
“I don’t think you would get to this volume without relaxing standards, and I’ve heard [Chief Garcia] say that… I don’t know that there’s anyone around here who would say they want to relax the standards of entry into the Dallas Police Department. I sure don’t hear that from anyone, and so this is just really concerning to me,” she said.
Marocco, the executive director of Dallas HERO, pushed back on the insinuations made by Willis in a statement to The Dallas Express.
“Willis cheapened citizens’ support of police officers and distorted the amendments’ proposals just to get cheap sound bites. She is an awful representative and has resisted the police efforts to grow or maintain even minimal numbers every single year,” Marocco said. “She’s so bad, like a defund the police conspirator. You have to pay police competitively — which is what the amendment says. DPD starting compensation is $12,000 below Plano, and Willis knows they are killing retention.”
He went on to call Willis a “shabby politician who doesn’t bother to read her materials, nor understand the impacts of her reckless soundbites.”
While appearing less hostile than Willis, Blackmon (District 9) expressed skepticism over the proposed increase to DPD.
“Can y’all handle training 4,000 and getting them on the street in a time frame?” Blackmon asked Police Chief Eddie Garcia on Wednesday.
Garcia did suggest he would prefer DPD to hire more slowly, but Blackmon seemed to suggest that a quicker expansion would be irresponsible.
“Cause you want to spend 18 months training them and making sure they know what they’re getting into, what the laws are. I mean, you don’t want to just put somebody out there with a gun and say, ‘Good luck,’” she quipped.
Marocco had choice words for her as well.
“Blackmon’s comments demonstrated that, like others on the council, she had not read the amendment or was deliberately opposing the police once again in a contrived manner,” he told DX. “The goal to get to three officers for every 1,000 citizens has repeatedly been cited as the minimum target for a decade. Blackmon has actively resisted DPD’s efforts to grow responsibly. The police force has eroded virtually every year under Blackmon’s backroom deals to oppose them.”
The Dallas City Council will be convening again on Wednesday, August 14, to discuss and act on four proposed charter amendment propositions stemming from citizen-led petitions. Dallas HERO organized three of the four.