Cowtown has a homosexual diversity and inclusion program for its police department, according to the Fort Worth Police Department’s website.
A section of the city’s website headlined “LGTBQ/FWPD Family” reads, “The Fort Worth Police Department is committed to diversity and inclusion and creating a safe environment for all those who work, live, visit, or conduct business here.”
Below this entry is an image of several police officers, arranged in what appears to be boy-girl fashion, holding hands and looking off into a rainbow over the City of Fort Worth. A QR code at the corner of the image that presumably would redirect users to more information about the program is currently disabled, and users are met with a “404” error message.
Homosexual recruitment efforts have been part of Fort Worth’s police recruitment policy for at least a decade. The department used Chris Gorrie, an openly gay detective, as a spokesman to recruit gay police officers through local media stories in 2014.
Gorrie was also used as a liaison to Fort Worth’s gay population to triage the department’s image after a raid on the Rainbow Lounge to check for underage drinkers and public intoxication resulted in one man reportedly receiving brain damage in 2009, as reported by CBS News.
Questions about the prudence of diversity and inclusion programs in paramilitary organizations such as police and fire departments have been mounting since the California wildfires incinerated large swaths of the Golden State.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass terminated Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristin Crowley, the department’s first lesbian chief, after there was national outrage about her department spending at least $300,000 per year on DEI programs while essential preparation efforts were neglected in the lead-up to the latest outbreak of wildfires.
One video that defined the debate over the LA Fire’s sexual DEI programs and fire preparedness showed LAFD Deputy Chief Kristine Larson responding to a hypothetical question about carrying a man out of a burning building with the quip, “He got himself in the wrong place if I have to carry him out of a fire.”
In the same video, Larson said that DEI was important to fire responses because people wanted to be saved from emergencies by people who look like themselves.
State Rep. Nate Schatzline (R-Fort Worth) has introduced legislation that seeks to ban DEI programs in municipal government, The Dallas Express previously reported.
“Our nation was built on the foundation of hard work, merit, and personal responsibility— principles that lead to true success, not skin color. Yet, DEI has infiltrated every corner of our society, wasting taxpayer dollars on divisive policies that serve only to pit us against one another,” he said in a press release.
Schatzline added that his proposed bills “enforce harsh penalties on those who refuse to comply with the law,” and taxpayers should not be forced to fund “radical ideology.”
One bill he introduced, HB 2770, reads, “A municipality that is determined…. [to have violated this law] may not receive grant funds for a period of two years following the date of the determination.” It also charges the comptroller with developing rules to implement the law “uniformly among the state agencies” that grant funds to municipalities.
At the time of this writing, the bill has not advanced past the introduction phase, and it is awaiting consideration by the House State Affairs Committee.
The Dallas Express contacted the city and the Fort Worth Police Department’s media relations department but did not receive a response by publication time.