Former Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings urging residents to vote "no" on HERO amendments

Mike Rawlings: HERO amendments will 'paralyze' city

Dallas voters are being asked to approve three charter amendments that some city leaders say would be nearly impossible for the city to afford. Former Dallas mayor Mike Rawlings joins FOX 4 to talk about controversial issues with these new amendments.

DALLAS - Three propositions on the November ballot for Dallas residents could change the way the city is run. Voters must decide if they are beneficial or harmful.

Former Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings is among a group of current and former Dallas city leaders urging voters not to approve the measures, saying it could paralyze the city.

"Every living mayor that was elected in Dallas, all the city council members, all the ex-city council members, all the state representatives, all the city commissioners, everybody in the city have come out and said these are going to be bad, they're going to hurt taxpayers. They're going to hurt the services that are delivered to those taxpayers," said Rawlings during Good Day on Monday.

The Propositions

Proposition S would allow Dallas residents to sue the city if it doesn't comply with the city charter, city ordinances and state law.Shall the Dallas City Charter be amended by adding a new chapter that grants standing to any resident of Dallas to bring a lawsuit against the city to require the city to comply with provisions of the city charter, city ordinances, and state law; entitles claimants to seek declaratory and injunctive relief against the city and recover costs and reasonable attorney’s fees; and waives the city’s governmental immunity from suit and liability in claims brought under this amendment?
Proposition T would create a community satisfaction survey related to the city manager's job - affecting compensation,Shall Chapter VI of the Dallas City Charter be amended by adding a new section compelling the city to conduct the city-commissioned Community Survey on an annual basis, to be completed by a minimum of 1,400 Dallas residents on their satisfaction on quality of life issues, the results of which will result in the city manager earning additional performance compensation (between 0 percent and 100 percent of the city manager’s annual base salary) or the termination of the city manager?
Proposition U focuses on public safety. It would require 50 percent of all new city revenue to go to police and fire pensions. It would also require a minimum of 4,000 police officers - that is 900 more officers than the current force.Shall Chapter XI of the Dallas City Charter be amended by adding a new section compelling city council to appropriate no less than 50 percent of annual revenue that exceeds the total annual revenue of the previous year to fund the Dallas Police and Fire Pension, with any monies remaining of that 50% to be appropriated to increasing the starting compensation of officers of the Dallas Police Department and to increase the number of police officers to a minimum of 4,000, and to maintain that ratio of officers to the City of Dallas population as of the date of passage of this amendment?

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Dallas HERO, the group which gathered 170,000 petition signatures to get the propositions on the ballot, says these measures would hold government officials accountable.

"I love holding government officials accountable," said Rawlings. "There's a right way and a wrong way to do it. (Proposition) S allows citizens to be able to sue the city for almost anything if it's in the city governance or the charter. No other city in the United States of America, no other state - the federal government - does not give away city immunity. For some reason, these people want Dallas to be the only city in the nation to give away immunity. So, neighbors can kind of sue the city if they get in an argument. Get in an argument about an ambulance not coming in time."

"We're very precise on all the rules and regulations at the city, so any I that's not dotted, we're going to have a plethora - a flood - of legal issues at the city. The lawyers are going to go crazy, being able to sue the city," said Rawlings.

Dallas HERO has pushed back on claims this proposition is unaffordable for the city, saying the $5 billion budget can afford it and there's too much unnecessary spending.

"I never said it was unaffordable," said Rawlings. "I think we need to hire more police officers. All these folks that are against these believe in hiring more police officers. The key is how to do it. It basically dictates how things are going to be run. We've got to make sure that we've got these folks trained, we've got to be able to recruit them. The chiefs of police, the good ones that we've worked with recently, said this is not the way to run it. We may have bad police officers out there. The key is retention and doing it right. Plus, it's going to cut all the other city services."

"The city of Dallas is the envy of the nation. People are coming (from) everywhere to be in the city of Dallas. We get the highest reports when we do our surveys at the top quartile. And it's going well. Do we have issues? Yes. And we've got to fix those. We don't want to be California. This is the way California does a plebiscite on referendums. We want a representative government. If we don't like our city council, if we don't like our mayor, let's get rid of them and let's get some new ones in there. But you don't do it with an edict from folks that are outside the city, throwing in this hand grenade to city hall.