The leader of a local nonprofit is claiming that members of the Dallas City Council pushed “fictional and reckless speculation” when voicing their opposition to a charter amendment that would bolster the understaffed Dallas Police Department.
Council members met Wednesday to discuss a proposed charter amendment requiring a police expansion of roughly 1,000 officers, increased police salaries to competitive levels, and added taxpayer support for the Dallas Police and Fire Pension System.
Dallas HERO, the local nonprofit, obtained the necessary resident signatures to add its proposal to amend the Dallas City Charter on the November ballot. However, several council members opposed the amendment over its alleged financial impact on other City services.
Pete Marocco, the executive director of Dallas HERO, claimed City leaders were engaging in uneducated speculation because and had not conducted the proper research.
“I have no idea what drove the city council’s fictional and reckless speculation that clearly was not supported by citizen petitioners’ plain language,” he told The Dallas Express. “It seemed clear most of the council had not reviewed their materials and was wildly making things up on the spot for the sake of hearing their own voice. Very lazy and disappointing. No wonder citizens demand better.”
DX reached out to the council members but did not receive a response by publication.
Council Member Paul Ridley (District 14) pushed a particularly dubious interpretation of Dallas HERO’s proposed amendment at Wednesday’s meeting. Ridley told City of Dallas CFO Jack Ireland the amendment was a “straightjacket on your ability to craft the budget.”
Ireland described the amendment as “restrictive” but noted that it authorized half of the City’s excess budget to be used on priorities outside the required support for law enforcement.
“Well, actually, that’s not quite true,” Ridley responded.
The council member then claimed that any excess budget would have to be spent on law enforcement. However, the amendment text from Dallas HERO confirms Ireland’s description of a split:
“If at any time the total actual, accruing or estimated annual revenue of the City exceeds the total actual annual revenue of the prior fiscal year, the City Council shall appropriate no less than 50% of such excess amount, in compliance with Section 1 of Chapter XI of this Charter, to fund the Dallas Police and Fire Pension System. Any monies remaining shall be appropriated to the Public Safety Objectives described below in Section B.”
Section B details the increase in police staff, pay, and pension. Marocco said the sentence on “monies remaining” applies to the 50% of excess funds used first on the pension system. The second half of excess funds could be used for other City services.
“The point that the city council absolutely fabricated was that this was going to somehow lock up the general fund,” he told DX. “Or that this would impact every single department. They made a number of mistakes, misinformation.”
Interim City Manager Kimberly Tolbert similarly pushed such misconceptions in her remarks at the meeting.
“Overall, you would be looking at drastic, very extreme cuts that we would have to make across the board,” she claimed.
“And that’s not just day-to-day, but that’s a drastic cut in every single service that we provided the city in order to be able to assume that additional number without giving us an opportunity to continue to do the work that we’re doing now,” she continued.
Morocco took issue with Tolbert’s claims.
“Kim Tolbert’s spurious allegation that every other City agency would have to cut resources is absolutely untrue and appears to be deliberate voter disenfranchisement,” he previously told DX.
The Dallas City Council will determine ballot language for the Dallas HERO amendment next week. Local leaders in Texas often manipulate ballot language to confuse voters, as previously reported by DX.