The population of Dallas has devolved from largely responsible individuals to those who are downright uncivilized, and many have further disintegrated into those who are just plain violent.
Take, for instance, the person who chooses to drive a car that has not been inspected, registered or insured. That driver is irresponsible, clearly. But how it devolves into incivility is when they hit an innocent person and damage another vehicle or property and then drive away.
Why are they so comfortable with fleeing the scene? Because the likelihood of being caught for doing so is missing, as is the probability of having their car taken away for failing to carry the required liability insurance.
The rising crime runs concurrently with the lack of any probability of being detected, caught, arrested, tried, and punished. That goes for all violations of the law.
Had those laws (registrations, insurance, and fraudulent paper tags) been enforced throughout all of Dallas, there would be fewer irresponsible people who devolve into being uncivilized or violent. The uniform enforcement of all laws leads to compliance. We have way too many people driving without a license, insurance, or proper registration (with or without a fraudulent paper tag on the back of their unsafe vehicles); since there is no penalty for any of that, more people will do it.
Since there is no penalty for speeding in Dallas, more people do it. Hence, we have a pedestrian fatality rate combined with a vehicular fatality rate higher than Dallas’ murder rate.
Thanks to our state government, we can now take home from a bar or restaurant alcoholic drinks, so we now have drunker drunks who may now have a gun under the seat of their vehicle courtesy of another law passed by the state of Texas.
What Dallas needs, in addition to more police officers, is a more civil society. We need our citizens not just to be civil but also responsible, which leads to fewer violent incidents between the public and the police.
Suppose we had our minority communities being just a little less violent with each other. In that case, there might be less demand on our officers to answer priority one calls, as they are never able to do anything else. Consider:
- Should we offer more police training?
- Do we need more police officers?
- Do we need to offer mandatory anger management classes to the public?
- Do the police need to enforce laws evenly without prejudice?
- Does the public need to acknowledge that the minority community is breaking the law at a much faster pace than non-minorities?
- Are there occasions when we need to fix the police?
- Are there many more occasions when we need to fix society?
The answer to the above questions is a resounding “yes.”
Since Dallas has consistently lowered the size of its police department since 2010 (except for three years), we are in dire straits as far as having any police protection whatsoever. So if you get carjacked or someone holds a knife to your throat, you’re going to need to call a social worker because the cops can’t get to you, and that is what our police-defunding communities wanted: Fewer cops.
The Dallas Police Department has consistently been removing services instead of scaling up the department’s size. No longer does DPD do fleet accidents; there is a whole division doing that under the Risk Management Department. The DPD no longer does parking enforcement, which was transferred to the Transportation Department. Don’t call 911 and expect that the car parked blocking your driveway will be moved. Don’t call about the suspicious occupied vehicle on your street; DPD won’t get there unless the occupants are shooting at you.
We now have Dallas Fire Rescue taking welfare checks, 911 hang-ups, and audible alarms, but that’s OK because they were given bulletproof vests for the fire engines and ladder trucks. By the way, those vehicles carry four people and get 3 miles per gallon burning diesel. Can we say environmentally friendly? The police answer the calls that DFR are taking, in other cities, and represents 18% of their call volume, making them slower getting to your house fire or cardiac arrest.
We, the public, are doing our own reports on 14 different offenses. The chief of police will tell you that’s so DPD can better serve you. Don’t look at the facts, like response times that are continuing to go up.
We are all experiencing this, and I will tell you, it’s not the fault of the street officers (I can’t call them patrol officers because they do not patrol). Why? Because there are not enough of them.
Our own Dallas County system of Injustice shares the blame for a less safe Dallas. We have just experienced six murders with the offenders wearing ankle monitors, one having violated his parole more than once, the other having threatened all family members of his former girlfriend who lived next door and assaulted her new boyfriend.
Bail reform and ankle monitors do not work for violent repeat offenders. Yet, they are among us, making us all potential future victims. These repeat offenders started out violating minor laws. First, they’re not serving any real-time, only encouraging the repeat violent offender to offend again!
When stealing under $750 became not punishable (because they needed it), it opened the floodgates for those who were irresponsible to become those who were uncivilized. When law enforcement cannot enforce criminal trespass laws, then we really have devolved. Thank You, John, you made us all less safe.
Yes, you reversed your decision on theft; it was ignorant from the beginning, but the weakening of law enforcement still lingers with the inability to enforce Criminal Trespass violations.
I understand they are working on laws in Austin to force district attorneys to do their jobs or be penalized. They are targeting DAs just like you, John Creuzot.
As we are all paying property taxes at a rate of 73.5 cents, we could be paying less and getting more as Richardson’s rate is 56 cents, Farmer’s Branch’s is almost 57 cents, and Addison’s is almost 61 cents on similarly valued homes. Let’s all thank our city leaders for blatantly screwing us over. With more taxes and much less safety, it is no wonder Dallas is growing at the slowest pace of any community in North Texas.
Mike Stapell is a retired North Texas public safety professional.
