Crime tax money in Fort Worth will continue. Now the focus shifts to how to spend it
Those who advocated for a pause in crime tax collection efforts are now shifting their focus to having a more prominent voice in how that money is allocated, and at least some city officials say they are more than willing to listen and negotiate.
Fort Worth voters approved the Crime Control and Prevention District on Tuesday. The half-cent sales tax has been devoted to police since 1995, and has grown from $26.6 million to more than $85 million budgeted for 2020. Altogether, the tax will provide Fort Worth police with an additional $1 billion through 2030. This revenue is in addition to what the police department receives through the city’s general fund, which this year amounted to more than $267 million.
Voters approved the tax with 64.37% of the vote, according to unofficial results.
Pamela Young, United Fort Worth organizer, one of the groups calling for voters to reject the sales tax proposition, says the battle for more and better representation in city budgeting decisions has already started. More than 200 letters have gone out to the city’s leaders demanding Fort Worth lean into a more participatory budgeting process, according to the United Fort Worth website.
Some Fort Worth representatives argue that the process has always been open to residents, but Young says it needs to be more open than it has been in the past to meet the new challenges the city must now face.
“I’ve not known the city of Fort Worth to organize any real conversations about the budget,” Young said. “In Dallas last year, they had more than 30 budget town halls that were spread out in the different council districts. They got and gave feedback. They answered questions on the spot.
“Compare that to Fort Worth. Fort Worth has public hearings that take place during City Council meetings. They allow folks to come up and speak for three minutes each and they move on to the next agenda item.
“You get up and speak, basically to yourself and sit down. That’s not a conversation. That’s the city saying we did something to be able to say that we did something.”
Sounds like common ground
City Councilwoman Kelly Allen Gray says resident input needs to increase with more than just the budgeting process. Engagement opportunities must be spread out over a number of platforms and tailored to a number of different audiences, Gray said.
Gray encouraged those who opposed extending the crime tax for another 10 years to redouble their efforts to make their voices heard. Gray said those voices are especially important now that Fort Worth faces a time of declining revenue in the past and in the future due to the ravages of the coronavirus.
“The conversation is not over,” Gray said. “When we come back from break we’re in budget. It is the perfect time to have the conversation about diversifying funding.”
In 2010, the council dissolved an independent board that oversaw the special fund and took control of managing the district — a move critics have said stifled transparency.
Gray said she would like to see the makeup of that board revisited, and is open to having resident participation on the board. The budget process will begin in earnest in early August and will not be approved until September, Gray said.
The protests and dialogue that have occurred in Fort Worth and worldwide triggered by the death of George Floyd at the hands of police has changed the atmosphere surrounding upcoming budget decisions. But during other times, after an initial blaze in activity, nothing substantial changed and that could happen again, Gray said.
“We have to figure out better ways to engage with the public,” Gray said. “I don’t know if anything will change. I have thought that before and then things got quiet.”
Manny Ramirez, president of the Fort Worth Police Officers Association, said the police department’s operating budget is lean to the point that there are dwindling resources to address critical and intensifying public safety issues.
But Ramirez encouraged residents to approach the city with an attitude of collaboration rather than confrontation during this budgeting process.
“Citizen input will be welcome and will continue to be welcome,” Ramirez said. “But the right way you approach folks in the city is by giving them new ideas. The wrong way is to go into council meetings and start screaming your demands at them.”
City called upon to do more and better
Estella Williams, Fort Worth branch NAACP president, said she would like to see the same effort the city invested in getting people to vote for the crime tax invested in getting people to voice their opinions about how that crime tax money should be allocated.
Williams said she perceived a difference in the energy devoted to the two endeavors.
The conversation around budgetary matters concerning public safety should be expanded to include Tarrant County and Fort Worth school officials, Williams suggested.
“Together we can achieve much more than apart.” Williams said. “We want to have dialogue, not just with the city, but the county and the school and any other places where decisions are made.
“What has happened in the past is not adequate. We know where the door is and we want to be able to enter into that door. We want to be able to see things happen in a different manner.”
Rod Smith, who represents the Justice Reform League, said his organization is prepared to meet with the council members to discuss budget priorities.
The organization wants to make sure that people who do not need to be incarcerated are no longer incarcerated, especially those with mental health issues who need treatment instead of imprisonment, Smith said.
But Smith said his organization is also preparing for a time after budget priorities have been settled.
“We want to have candidates running for office and make sure that they have an agenda put forth,” Smith said. “We are vetting candidates now and we will definitely have some candidates running for office. We want to make sure that the people in the community are taken care of.”
Young also pointed out that the city needed to increase its funding for anti-poverty measures that have been exacerbated by the pandemic saying the root causes of violence are often related to poverty.
Homelessness, joblessness, food insecurity and a lack of adequate health care all need to be dealt with through the city budget, Young said.
“These issues need to be top of mind, they need to be top priorities in our city budget and we would like to see that happen for the fiscal year 2021 budget,” Young said. “Northwest Texas Legal Aid’s housing attorneys are busier than ever. We need a safety net for all the people who have been affected by this coronavirus. They have lost income, jobs, and have lost homes. That has yet to be adequately attended to by the city of Fort Worth.”
This story was originally published July 15, 2020 at 5:25 PM.
