5 OctOber 10 - 16, 2024 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents chance of passing, he’s not too optimistic. “My guess,” he says, “is it’s a coin flip. And that’s terrifying.” Scare Tactics J eff Patterson wasn’t getting the an- swers he wanted. It was Friday, Aug. 9, and Pete Marocco was talking about the proposed amendments with the Dallas Firefighters As- sociation, of which Patterson is the president. The longtime firefighter wanted to know who was backing the amendments, and he says Marocco was “vague,” replying that, as a tax-exempt 501(c)(4) organization — a part of the tax code intended to shelter “social welfare” groups — HERO is not obligated to share details about its backers. Patterson would later learn that noted conservative and hospitality real estate bil- lionaire Monty Bennett was providing the group with financial assistance, but by that time, he’d already soured on their efforts. “We didn’t feel like we were getting the full story,” he told the Observer. This is a common refrain among HERO critics, particularly because, at one point, a proposed fourth amendment wanted to eliminate the use of police chokeholds. In response to the Observer’s question about why this proposal was publicized on its website in April (then taken down), Ma- rocco said, “More than a dozen propositions were considered by Dallas HERO, but we didn’t move forward on them because we chose to prioritize what truly matters: ac- countability at Dallas City Hall, empowering citizens and ensuring public safety.” On that note, Patterson doesn’t feel the group is representative of Dallas. For instance, he and one of his fellow as- sociation members took issue with the fact that Marocco doesn’t live in the city. (“I lived in Dallas for years, but a few months ago, I moved only a few blocks into University Park, where police staffing is adequate for response and deterrence,” Marocco told the Observer. “We looked at other parts of Dallas and just didn’t feel safe.”) Patterson also disliked a mailer sent by HERO that featured a hooded figure and an all-caps headline reading “The bottom of your ballot is our last line of defense.” Nota- bly, the mailer also includes crime-related headlines from the Dallas Express, a conser- vative news site launched by Bennett. “The elderly, the seniors, that’s the kind of stuff that might scare them,” Patterson says. “They could be bullied by scare tactics.” On paper, Patterson might seem like the kind of person who’d favor the HERO propos- als. He’s a firefighter who has spent decades serving the city (with burns on 48% of his body), and the amendments promise to flow boatloads of money toward the troubled and underfunded police and fire pension system. But Patterson is confident the pension is- sue will be resolved (“They have to fund it, by law”), and as he talks to the Observer, it’s clear he values his association and their opinions over the amendment’s promises. “We just think it’s bad for fire, and we’re in agreement with the city on it — which is rare,” he says. Nearly all City Council members have spoken out against the proposals, with Ba- zaldua perhaps the most vocal opponent. Still, when reached for comment, Bazaldua’s team says he couldn’t share much due to on- going litigation. (The city manager’s office said the same thing, and the city’s CFO did not reply to a request for comment.) That’s because of a case the Texas Su- preme Court recently weighed in on. Earlier this year, the council proposed amendments that would give it the final say in how to spend the city’s money while also granting local government immunity from lawsuits. HERO sued, with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton writing in support of the group’s efforts. Ultimately, the state’s highest court or- dered the removal of the council’s amend- ments, meaning they won’t appear on the November ballot. For Kingston, this decision was further proof that the Supreme Court is “not a legal reasoning entity; it’s a political entity.” “There’s nothing misleading in what the City Council put forward,” he added in a late September interview. “The court invited them to rewrite the amendments in accordance with the court’s guidance, and they don’t have a lot of other things they can do, other than get out there and campaign. I’m a little bit miffed at them for not already doing that.” Bazaldua has now started cam- paigning, appearing at the “Vote No Dallas” event, and as the election nears, the group’s efforts will likely continue ramping up. But counter-campaigns like theirs are expensive, and Kingston laments the city’s loss of “good billionaires.” “The progressive rich people have just kind of left town,” he says. “I was talking to a friend of mine who runs campaigns, and I asked him how much he’d need to mount a campaign.” The friend told him “a quarter of a million.” Others say it’d be much higher. Soft Targets C hris Harris helped defeat an effort that bears striking similarities to the HERO proposals. In 2021, Harris, now a leader with the Texas Civil Rights Project, was part of an Aus- tin-based coalition that mounted an education and outreach campaign against Proposition A. Had it passed, the city would have been forced to hire hundreds of new police officers. This proposal was the work of Save Aus- tin Now, a group led in part by far-right Re- publicans who, mere months earlier, had successfully advocated for a ban on home- less encampments. “Save Austin Now took the same sort of tactic Dallas HERO is taking,” Harris says, citing both groups’ insistence that the city could afford the new requirements. Harris is something of a city budget expert, and he tells the Observer that the HERO group is conveniently forgetting the presence of other city employees. At minimum, those employees need cost-of-living adjustments. “Unless they plan on not giving any city workers any additional raises, it’s not clear how they do this without cuts,” Harris says. “The other piece of the budget puzzle is the city needs to grow.” That means additional staff members and additional services. “Ideally, the city would be able to have additional park space, libraries, economic and workforce development initiatives — those are the things that come along with more people,” Harris says. “Even stagnating with some of those things means you’re serving less people over time, and it’s not clear what additional money or revenue will be left.” Harris doesn’t remember exactly how much money was spent fighting Prop A (and, as reported by the Tribune, George So- ros’ Open Policy Center kicked in half a million.) Coupled with the fact that Dallas is bigger than Austin (and the media buys are more expensive), Harris says the people organizing against HERO have their work cut out for them. It’s not clear to what degree — if any — HERO’s critics are coalescing, aside from the statements made by some former and current city officials. Patterson says his association will likely join the fray, though he is not sure what that will look like — and many members of the fire association still resent the way Rawlings handled their pension funding, making an alliance with him unlikely. In an interview with the Observer, the Dallas Democratic Party said it is circulating talking points against HERO but also focusing a lot of its efforts in support of Allred and Sam Eppler, who’s running against GOP incumbent Beth Van Duyne in District 24. Unlike Harris’ ef- forts in Austin, there has yet to be a coalition of organizers joining hands, though Changa Higgins, a longtime organizer, says he is go- ing to change that in the days ahead. “Sometimes you just have to be the con- vener,” he says. “I’m on the police oversight board, and the most trouble with crime is happening in South Dallas, where we al- ready have a high police presence. So I gotta ask, ‘Who are the police for?’” Brandon Rottinghaus, a political scientist at the University of Houston, says an effec- tive education campaign is “crucial” to the success or defeat of amendments like these. He also thinks these efforts will become more common. “We’ve seen a rise in the number of orga- nizations that are politically motivated and trying to implement their wishes,” he said. “These policies are soft targets, because it al- lows someone who has a lot of money to en- gineer a change, and so few signatures are needed.” (HERO needed 20,000 voters to get each amendment on the ballot, and it re- ceived over 169,000.) Like others interviewed for this story, Rottinghaus says the absence of a local, high-dollar donor certainly hurts HERO’s critics. He grew up in Dallas, and he remem- bers phone-banking at the law office of Fred Baron, a major fundraiser for the Demo- cratic Party. “There have been people historically who are ultra-wealthy and on the left wing in Dallas, but not so much anymore.” Further, he cautions anyone who thinks Democrats will immediately reject the bal- lot measures. For one, they’ll appear far down on the ballot, by which point many voters may not read carefully. Secondly, without an aggressive education campaign, Rottinghaus says many voters may see the blurb about additional money for police and fire and not think too much about what it portends. “People may see that and think it’s a no- brainer,” he says. “But, obviously, the long term could be a bit complicated.” Campbell, the 62-year-old father who lost his wife, didn’t know too much about HERO. His daughter’s upcoming birthday was much higher on his list of priorities, es- pecially because he now has a place to host it. That apartment complex pool may come in handy, and he’s thinking about sending out invitations, making it a full bash. He’s also thinking about giving back. He wants to share his story, maybe volun- teer at Family Gateway and help others in his shoes. As he repeated often when chatting for this story, people like him just need a little help. “It’s like a bird,” he says: “When they have a broken wing, you gotta help until you can let it go. Now my wing isn’t broken any- more, but we got some other broken wings out there that need fixing.” ▼ TRUE CRIME UNNATURAL CAUSES DALLAS JOURNALIST’S PODCAST DIVES DEEP INTO A PROLIFIC SERIAL KILLER CASE. BY KELLY DEARMORE I t’s been just over a year since convicted murderer Billy Chemirmir was mur- dered in a Texas prison at the age of 50. At the time of his death, caused by stabbing and blunt force trauma, the Kenyan-born Chemirmir had been convicted of only two murders, although he had been indicted on 22 counts of capital murder. He received a life sentence without parole for each of his convictions, but managed to stay alive only less than two years after being sentenced. Chemirmir’s story regularly made “Unless they plan on not giving any city workers any additional raises, it’s not clear how they do this without cuts.The other piece of the budget puzzle is the city needs to grow.” -Chris Harris, Texas Civil Rights Project >> p7
