More than a month after Cara Mendelsohn withdrew a charter amendment to change Dallas’ form of government, she told The Dallas Express it remains a viable option.
“A strong mayor form of government is an idea worthy of deep consideration,” District 12 Council Member Mendelsohn said in a text message.
“I withdrew the amendment in the same five minutes I made it because it wasn’t a serious proposal at this time. I think a city form of government with a strong mayor, adding some at-large councilmembers, or adding councilmembers who represent a quadrant of the city, are ideas the charter commission could have developed and debated.”
But that’s not what happened on June 18, when Mendelsohn, during a Dallas City Council meeting, offered the amendment based on a resident’s recommendation to the Dallas Charter Review Commission months earlier.
“I move to change our city government to a strong mayor system,” Mendelsohn said. “… As one of the largest cities in America that still has a city manager form of government, I don’t believe it’s in the best interest of the residents to not have at least fully explored this topic. There’s a lack of accountability when the most powerful person for the city is not actually elected by the people, not accountable to the people. They’re not accountable to the voters.”
The City of Dallas has operated under the manager-council form of government since 1931, according to the city charter. Under such a system, Dallas’ 14 council members create policy, and the city manager executes it. As the city’s chief executive officer, the city manager is responsible for Dallas’ roughly 14,000 employees, including department heads.
Former Deputy City Manager Kimberly Tolbert is the interim city manager. The position is one of four appointed by the city council, along with the city auditor, city attorney, and city secretary.
The charter provides that the 15th member of the council — the mayor — presides over the city council and “shall have a vote on all matters coming before the city council, other than confirmation of appointments by the mayor, unless otherwise disqualified, but no power to veto. The mayor shall be the official head of the city government.”
As mayor, Eric Johnson has no authority except that which is granted to him by the city charter.
“In addition to the mayor’s other duties, the mayor shall ensure that annual reports are made as to the state of the city, its financial condition, its accomplishments, and its plan and needs for the future,” according to the charter.
This form of government is also called the “weak mayor” system because it gives the city manager broad control over Dallas.
“The voters should be choosing their leader,” Mendelsohn said during the June 18 meeting. “The accountability of a city manager form of government is lost throughout an organization through bureaucratic layers that obscure problems and ineffectiveness. And, clearly, we have seen this throughout our service here.”
Mendelsohn took office in June 2019 and has twice been re-elected. Former City Manager T.C. Broadnax, now the city manager in Austin, was in office in Dallas for seven years before leaving in May.
“And I decided not to list off items because I’m not intending to criticize anybody who’s held that role, currently holds that role, anything like that,” Mendelsohn said.
“It’s really about improving the city. The third item is the speed of the response, which we’ve seen firsthand. If you’ve been watching Houston and their ability for that mayor to jump in there, solve any issue they want — whether it’s to try to make an enticing offer to one of our employees, whether it’s launching an investigation, structuring a budget — things that are extremely difficult, if not impossible, to [have] happen around this horseshoe.”
Johnson did not immediately answer a request for comment.
Under the mayor-council form of government, Houston Mayor John Whitmire is the city’s chief executive officer. Five council seats are at-large positions, and 11 positions are elected to districts “of roughly the same proportion of population.” The mayor, council members, and the city controller are elected to four-year terms that start on January 2.
Among the largest cities in Texas — Dallas, Fort Worth, Austin, Houston, and San Antonio — Houston is the only one with a mayor-council form of government. Neither the council members nor the mayor of Houston responded to requests for comment by publication.
“The system under a city manager form of government is actually meant to neutralize elected officials and, frankly, is set up structurally with conflict,” Mendelsohn said during the council meeting. “What I’d love to ask the public, the mayor, … is for an independent group to actually evaluate, study this idea and hopefully bring it back in two years to the council for a fuller discussion.”
Mendelsohn then withdrew the amendment, and no other council member weighed in on her comments.
“There wasn’t any discussion at all,” she told DX. “I hope there will be a nonpartisan civic group that will thoroughly study various governance options, evaluate how they could benefit Dallas, and make a proposal that includes more accountability to our residents and stronger governance from elected officials.
“Today, we have a council-manager system that yields nearly absolute authority to a city manager and bureaucrats hired without councilmember input, where the only option for accountability is replacement of the city manager by a majority of councilmembers.”
Dallas residents voted against changing the city’s form of government in 2005. The Dallas Morning News attributed the rejection to residents of South Dallas, who largely opposed the measure.
Former Mayor Mike Rawlings told DMN that “council’s never going to want to do this.”
But, he declared, “The citizens would want this. They would love it.”
The president of Revitalize South Dallas Coalition, Ken Smith, gave DMN a similar opinion.
“What’s lacking in the city of Dallas is our vision and a system that would produce leaders, not managers,” Smith said. “We don’t need any more managers.”