Dallas leaders are divided over support for Dallas Area Rapid Transit amid talks to cut funding for the transit agency.
The city’s Transportation and Infrastructure committee voted Monday to add to its list of legislative priorities a line to fully fund DART.
That's in opposition to another committee's legislative agenda: A motion to restructure DART's funding is among the Government Performance and Financial Management committee's list of legislative priorities.
"It's two different positions on this," District 10 council member Kathy Stewart said. "Each committee is going to take a different position."
Opposing viewpoints
District 8 council member Tennell Atkins proposed the motion for the Transportation and Infrastructure committee to include the item to support DART in an upcoming council briefing on Wednesday. It passed 6 to 1.
“We can testify on transportation. The other committee wants to testify about funding or a revenue source, then they should be something different," Atkins said. "I don't think we should have one or the other. I think it should be both."
District 12 council member Cara Mendelsohn voted against it.
Mendelsohn is among city leaders across the region who want to reduce their 1-cent sales tax contribution to DART by 25%. Several of DART's 13 member cities have passed symbolic resolutions to do so, including Plano, Irving and Rowlett.
Committee chair Omar Narvaez said that while it is rare for two opposing recommendations to be made to the council, it has been done before.
“We had dual recommendations, one from one body, one from the other," he said. "But as a whole, that's the only vote that matters."
The committee's legislative agenda will now go to a full council briefing on Wednesday morning.
Regional disagreements
As Dallas considers whether to call for cuts or full funding to DART, the Regional Transportation Council is calling on the Legislature to "protect existing transportation authority dedicated funding" in its list of legislative priorities.
During a meeting of the RTC Thursday, regional transportation director Michael Morris said he advised that cities not restructure DART’s funding until the North Central Texas Council of Governments completes its Transit 2.0 study that would forecast DART’s revenue and costs over the next 30 years.
One of the legislative items put forth by NCTCOG staff would seek to limit companies from moving their business to cities that aren’t a member of a transit agency.
“Being in the middle of Transit 2.0 and dealing with the controversies within the DART board, some percentage of that anger – anger is the right English word – is DART cities losing employers to non-transit authority cities,” Morris said.
Several city leaders spoke against the item, including Plano Mayor John Muns and Dallas City Council Member Cara Mendelson.
“I don't really think that if you are in Fort Worth, God bless you, you don't get to decide what we as a member city are going to do about DART," she said. "It's just not your role."
The Regional Transportation Council plans to approve its legislative agenda at a meeting next month.
Pablo Arauz Peña is KERA’s growth and infrastructure reporter. Got a tip? Email Pablo at parauzpena@kera.org. You can follow him on X @pabloaarauz.
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