As the November election nears, Dallas City Council members are facing numerous lawsuits over proposed city charter amendments that would reportedly undermine citizen-led reforms.
Dallas residents are set to vote on 21 proposed amendments to the Dallas City Charter in November. The Dallas Express has reported that six of the amendments appear to conflict with each other.
Three were proposed by a citizen-led petition campaign organized by local nonprofit organization Dallas HERO, and the other three were proposed by Dallas City Council members.
One of the amendments proposed by Dallas HERO would require the City of Dallas to add around 1,000 police officers to the Dallas Police Department, increase police officers salaries, and improve the Dallas police and fire pension system. The other two proposed amendments would allow residents to sue city leaders for failing to follow the city charter, city code, and state law, as well as tie the city manager’s bonus pay to an annual resident survey.
Three charter amendments proposed by Dallas City Council members appear to have been added to the ballot with the intention to undermine the three Dallas HERO amendments.
The first amendment, proposed by District 6 Councilmember Omar Narvaez, grants the Dallas City Council complete authority over the city’s budget—virtually overruling Dallas HERO’s amendment requiring more pay for law enforcement.
District 7 Councilmember Adam Bazaldua proposed an amendment to grant legal immunity to all council members and city officials, overriding Dallas HERO’s amendment that would allow residents to sue city officials.
Lastly, District 13 Councilmember Gay Donnell Willis introduced an amendment to give the city council control over the city manager’s salary, once again overriding one of Dallas HERO’s amendments.
Since the three amendments have been put on the ballot, Dallas HERO has filed three lawsuits—two at the state level and one at the federal level.
The lawsuit at the federal level was joined by Dallas resident Cathy Cortina Arvizu, who signed Dallas HERO’s three petitions for the proposed amendments. The lawsuit names all members of the Dallas City Council except Mayor Eric Johnson and District 12 Councilmember Cara Mendelsohn, who opposed the council members’ three amendments.
The federal lawsuit alleges that the council members’ amendments violated Arvizu’s civil rights, saying, “This grotesque action by the City Council was a desperate last-minute attempt to introduce separate ballot propositions designed and written to confuse, mislead, and disenfranchise the city of Dallas voters.”
“The City Council intended to mislead and cause confusion among voters, diminish the ability of voters to discern and distinguish the city’s propositions from other propositions on the ballot, and nullify the will of voters,” reads the lawsuit per the Dallas Morning News.
Similar lawsuits were also filed by Dallas HERO with the Texas Supreme Court and the Texas Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas. The lawsuits state that the council members’ amendments violate the Texas Constitution’s one-subject rule and break a good faith agreement between the city and Dallas HERO.
“Put simply the City’s last-minute addition of ballot language is nothing more than a desperate attempt to mask their misleading language in a separate ballot proposition which only leads to one result, which is to mislead and disenfranchise the voters of the City of Dallas,” reads the lawsuit.
No ads. No paywalls. No government grants. No corporate masters.
Just real news for real Texans.
Support Texas Scorecard to keep it that way!
