Dallas Police Department officials say overall violent crime is down significantly since last year. But while aggravated assaults and robberies are down, the city’s murder rate has increased.
That’s what police officials told the city council's public safety committee on Monday. The end-of-year update comes after police executives and Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson touted public safety as a top priority for the city.
According to the briefing, overall violent crimes are down just shy of 12%. Dallas Police Department Major Jason Scoggins said aggravated assaults', in particular, decreased dramatically.
“They’re down over 15%,” Scoggins said during the meeting. “[That] translates to over 1,000 less victims this year as compared to last year.”
But while the department managed to bring the overall violent crime rate down, not all categories trended lower.
“We’ve had our challenges this year,” Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia said during the meeting. “Particularly with murder being higher than it was last year.”
As of October 31, the city’s murder rate had increased over 13% since last year. Officials did not discuss the trend in detail but their presentation listed the increase as being driven “argument [and] conflict.”
Staffing struggles
As has been the trend with most of the violent crime updates, police executives gave the same answer when asked what else they needed to keep the crime rates lower.
“One thing we need is more staffing,” Garcia said. “We need to grow as a department, there’s no question about it.”
Department officials have struggled to recruit — and keep — officers for Dallas. Fixing that challenge hinges, in part, on fixing structural issues with the city’s fire and police pension system, they say.
Currently, the city's police and fire personnel who rely — or will rely — on the pension system for retirement may not see benefits increase for almost two decades. A team of actuaries told city council members last week stagnant benefits could make it even harder to recruit new officers.
Many city officials have said a main priority for policymakers should be dealing with violent crime. Johnson cited public safety as part of the reason he joined the Republican Party in September, months after he'd been re-elected as a Democrat. He said he'd be better able to find “common sense solutions” to political differences and to strive for “law and order” as a Republican.
“Our cities desperately need the genuine commitment to these principles…that has long been a defining characteristic of the GOP,” Johnson wrote.
Council members praised police officials for the decreases in overall violent crime rate and had limited discussion about the increase in murders. They are scheduled to brief the committee again in December.
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