Dallas group accuses city of ignoring voter-approved police mandate
Last November,
Dallas voters approved a charter amendment requiring the city to maintain a police force
of at least 4,000 officers. Now, the group behind Proposition U believes the city has been disregarding the legal mandate since it passed.
Dallas HERO Executive Director Damien LeVeck says when Dallas residents voted for Proposition U, public safety was top of mind.
The charter amendment has been controversial among some Dallas leaders.
It mandates at least 50% of any additional revenue the city receives to be directed to the police and fire pension and higher police salaries. It also forces the city to maintain a minimum police force of 4,000 officers.
"Four thousand is not an arbitrary number," LeVeck said. "Actually, when you take the ratio of 4,000 officers to the population of Dallas that puts it on par with most cities in America which is about three officers per 1,000 residents."
LeVeck said as of Feb. 7, DPD had 3,169 officers. He said Dallas HERO sent the City of Dallas a notification of a claim for disregarding Proposition U.
On X, the group said, "The city has 60 days to make a good-faith effort to comply before facing litigation."
"What that means is that we would like to see a good-faith effort on the part of the city that they have the intention of obeying the law," LeVeck said. "The problem is with the exception of one council member, nobody at the city has even acknowledged publicly the existence of Proposition U which was a mandate by the voters."
Last month, District 12 Councilmember Cara Mendelsohn offered a resolution for consideration, increasing police hiring goals for this fiscal year from 300 to 325 new officers, and then adding even more in the years to follow.
Interim Police Chief Michael Igo said this would be difficult to reach.
"Moving the needle to 325, means me moving critical resources with the patrol bureau, with the thought of increased response times and increase in crime overall," he said last month.
"We are sensitive to the challenges that the police department has," LeVeck said. "We always said that we felt like it would be possible to do this in 3 to 5 years."
He said that would mean a hiring goal of about 400 officers per year.
CBS News Texas reached out to the Dallas mayor and city council members for comment tonight but have not heard back.
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