Dallas City Hall needs a turnaround season

The Texas Rangers are making the summer interesting as they battle the Houston Astros for supremacy of the American League West division. General manager Chris Young, a good local boy and Highland Park Scot, decided to make some changes in both management and the players. It’s working.

If the city of Dallas were a baseball team at midpoint in the season, you could be sure they would not be headed to the playoffs. Who is saying this? Dallas residents, who recently pilloried the city almost across the board on its performance in a recent satisfaction study.

ETC Institute completed its 10th citizen satisfaction study on behalf of the city of Dallas. The Kansas-based company is the national leader, having completed 2 million surveys in 1,000 cities since 2010. It first surveyed Dallas in 2006.

That longevity is useful. It gives us an indication of whether Dallas is improving, or getting worse. It’s mostly the latter. Dallas citizens are resoundingly concerned about the direction of the city. No one likes a prolonged losing streak.

The two biggest indicators that citizens are unsatisfied with the city’s direction are the perceived value they receive for their tax dollars and the current direction of the city. In both categories citizens did not hold back in assigning failing grades.

Nearly half (47%) believe that they are not receiving a good value for their tax dollars. Only 3% assigned the highest rating regarding getting their money’s worth, while a total of 24% thought that there was generally good value for their tax dollars. In 2014 that number stood at 44%.

Only 5% feel strongly about the current direction of the city. Compare this with the 41% that feel strongly the direction is headed the wrong way. The “fans” do not approve of the current level of play.

Overall, only 28% of citizens polled were “pleased with the overall direction that the city of Dallas is taking.” In 2014 that number was 53%.

To go from every other citizen being satisfied to about half that number is a tragic fall, and a huge hole to dig out from.

“They don’t look very satisfied,” City Council member Cara Mendelsohn remarked. “The results are pretty shocking and should be a wake-up call.”

I know throwing out wonkish City Hall statistics is as enjoyable as being stuck on an elevator with a talkative CrossFitter, but in this case the story is the numbers.

There were 1,475 surveys completed across all 14 City Council districts. For a city with a 2020 Census population of 1,304,379, that might seem low. But the number of completed surveys is more than residents who voted for the winners in four City Council districts in the most recent election.

Importantly, the study represented a true demographic cross-section from every council district — much more so than local elections do. Only 37% of household members included were age 50 or older, and only 16% over 65. By contrast, Dallas voters skew well over 60, on average. Half of the survey respondents have lived in Dallas longer than 30 years. And 60% are owners of a home.

Citizens are clamoring for improvements in three primary areas: homelessness, police and crime, and streets.

In the comments section, one respondent summed up the complaints: “If you care about this city, make sure it’s safe, the roads aren’t full of potholes, and that it’s easy to open a business.”

Respondents fear for their safety. Only 3% feel very safe from violent crime, but 20% feel very unsafe from it. Similarly, 2% feel very safe from property crime, while 23% feel very unsafe from it. Just 1% of citizens feel very safe in downtown Dallas after dark, while 24% feel very unsafe and another 35% feel unsafe. Most worrisome, only 42% of citizens feel very safe or somewhat safe in their own neighborhood after dark. When nearly half of citizens feel this way at home, there is a serious problem.

There is also a deterioration in satisfaction for police service. In 2014, crime was only perceived as a major problem by 39% of citizens. Now that number is 61%. The 2014 study reported that 55% of respondents were satisfied with police response times. It has now fallen to 24%. Crime prevention has fallen from 50% to 23% satisfied.

Homelessness is identified by 75% of respondents as a major problem, compared with only 40% in 2014.

Street and sidewalk maintenance was the top priority of 59% of respondents. Residents gave failing grades to the condition of thoroughfares, neighborhood streets, alleys and sidewalks. Thoroughfare conditions were rated poor, the lowest category, by 43% of citizens. (Somehow 2% thought them excellent. I’d like to find where they are doing their driving.) Nearly half of the respondents thought maintenance of neighborhood streets was poor. Amazingly, the city manager’s proposed budget for the next two years calls for a total budget reduction in spending on transportation and infrastructure.

Another department rated as badly as streets was planning, where only 5% rated it excellent and 71% thought it poor or fair. (I’ll cover this much more thoroughly in a future piece.)

Other areas have seen a dramatic downturn since the 2014 survey. A reduction of 20 or more points occurred in several important areas:

• The perception of Dallas as a place to live
• The perception of Dallas as a place to retire
• Quality of economic development
• Ease of bus travel
• Access to affordable, quality health care
• Access to affordable, quality child care
• Access to affordable, quality housing (a massive 41-point drop)

The city’s favorability as a place to raise children has fallen by 15%, as well.

These are the same huge drop-offs in satisfaction the Rangers saw during their losing years. Unfortunately, citizens cannot send a message by not attending games. They have to keep paying taxes, even in bad years, unless they plan to move. The question the survey does not ask, and should be included in future studies, is, “Do you plan to continue living in Dallas?”

I worry that one respondent might decide to move: “Pull corporate jobs back into Dallas city proper,” the respondent noted, “instead of far flung suburbs like Frisco. I am so tired of having to commute huge distances for an office job. We need more density in Dallas proper, rather than driving 40 minutes one way for dinner, work and friends.”

With the city apparently seeking a bond package of more than $1 billion, will these unhappy citizens back such a bold initiative, especially when the trend over the past 10 years seems downward?

Now that the Dallas City Council has returned from its monthlong summer All-Star break, I hope they’ll decide, like Rangers’ ownership, to chart a course out of last place. Fix the streets, make the city safe, improve the homeless and panhandling problems. Citizens want basic city services that they feel are a good value for their tax dollars.

That’s the playoffs and the payoff.

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