After a lengthy closed-door session and virtually no discussion in public, the Dallas City Council voted to remove sections of a 1988 ordinance that created a police officer to resident staffing ratio during Wednesday's meeting.
The move comes after two controversial city charter amendments aimed at allowing residents to sue the city and creating police hiring mandates, were approved by Dallas voters on election night.
KERA previously reported that removing the police officer to resident ratios could be a way for the city to avoid being sued under two new charter amendments.
Propositions S allows Dallas residents to sue the city for violating the charter, local ordinances, or state law. Under the amendment, the city must waive its governmental immunity.
The 1988 ordinance included a set of proposals from the city manager to improve the police department. One proposal was a series of police staffing increases.
“The city manager will increase the total number of police officers serving the city by at least 150 per year for each of the next four years and, thereafter, will maintain a ratio of at least three police officers per one thousand citizens,” the ordinance said.
Right now, the city isn't in compliance with that ordinance. The council could vote to remove those previsions, according to a drafted amendment to the ordinance.
But even if the council removes sections of the ordinance — the city could still be left open to a lawsuit if it doesn’t comply with the new hiring mandates created by Proposition U. That measure, passed on election night, requires the city to hire hundreds more officers to reach a total staffing level of 4,000.
Pete Marocco is the executive director of Dallas HERO, the group responsible for placing the propositions on the ballot. Marocco said during Wednesday’s meeting amending the ordinance wasn’t taking the “will of the people” into consideration.
“I heard someone earlier in this session talk about the problem with people pursuing revenge motives instead of the will of the people,” Marocco said. “What they need to focus on is getting the police back to the minimum level…instead of these emotional, reactive, impulsive decisions.”
Marocco, and his Dallas HERO group, have gained significant scrutiny over their efforts to get their amendments passed on election night. That includes questions into the group’s funders, who ran its campaign — and what their ultimate goal was.
Marocco lives in University Park, according to a past city council registered speakers list. And one of Dallas HERO’s few public donors, hotelier Monty Bennett, claims a homestead exemption in Highland Park — a wealthy enclave outside of the Dallas city limits.
The day before the election, D Magazine reported Marocco had been accused of entering the U.S. Capitol during the Jan 6, 2021 insurrection. Marocco denied those claims in a statement to the magazine.
Bennett, who also serves as the publisher of the Dallas Express, has been accused of using the publication to discredit other media organizations — and promote his own interests, according to a sweeping investigation into the HERO movement published in the Texas Observer.
Now that the council has voted to remove parts of the 1988 ordinance, the city may still be facing an uphill legal fight. The city must still comply with a similar mandate as the ordinance, after Proposition U was approved by Dallas voters.
Got a tip? Email Nathan Collins at ncollins@kera.org. You can follow Nathan on Twitter @nathannotforyou.
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