Dallas has changed. Its public safety infrastructure must keep up.
Dallas is not the city it was twenty, thirty, or seventy years ago. Our population has grown. Our skyline has changed. Our business community has expanded. The demands placed on police officers, firefighters, 911 professionals, emergency managers, and the people supporting them have grown dramatically.
Some of the infrastructure behind them has not kept pace.
Proposition A is about changing that.
$443 MILLION. FIVE PROJECTS. ONE PURPOSE.
Proposition A invests in five specific public safety infrastructure projects designed to help Dallas meet the demands of the city it has become.
POLICE TRAINING
Complete the new Law Enforcement Training Center and provide modern facilities for the men and women preparing to serve Dallas.
SPECIALIZED PUBLIC SAFETY TRAINING
Create modern facilities for firearms training, emergency vehicle operations, and realistic scenario-based training so officers can prepare for difficult decisions before they have to make them on Dallas streets.
EVIDENCE & PROPERTY PROTECTION
Replace an evidence and property operation housed in a facility dating to the 1940s, where storage has reached capacity, active roof leaks threaten critical evidence, and more than 200,000 firearms are under the responsibility of the operation.
911 + EMERGENCY OPERATIONS
Modernize critical 911 and emergency-management infrastructure currently operating from the basement of Dallas City Hall in facilities identified as lacking modern technology and current industry standards.
FIRE STATION NO. 4
Replace a downtown fire station that has served Dallas since 1953 and whose current property cannot accommodate the additional apparatus bay identified as necessary for downtown.
Five projects. Different missions. One common problem.
Dallas has outgrown portions of the physical infrastructure behind its public safety system.
THIS IS ABOUT MORE THAN BUILDINGS.
It is easy to look at Proposition A as a construction proposal. We believe there is another way to look at it.
This is about risk.
Every major city manages risk every day. Police departments manage the risks associated with firearms, emergency driving, use of force, crisis response, and split-second decision-making. Fire departments manage increasingly complex emergencies in increasingly complex environments. 911 professionals and emergency managers are expected to keep critical systems functioning when the rest of the city may be experiencing its worst day. Evidence personnel safeguard property and evidence upon which investigations and criminal cases may depend.
The facilities supporting those missions matter.
Better infrastructure cannot eliminate risk, but inadequate infrastructure can increase it.
That distinction is important.
THE RISK OF DOING NOTHING
Doing nothing is sometimes presented as the least expensive option.
It isn't necessarily the same thing as the least costly option.
When a known infrastructure deficiency is left unresolved, the risk does not disappear. The city simply continues to carry it.
Inadequate training can contribute to preventable mistakes, injuries, vehicle collisions, critical incidents, claims, and litigation. Inadequate evidence facilities can create risks involving security, preservation, capacity, and case integrity. Aging emergency communications infrastructure creates concerns about reliability and continuity when those systems are needed most. A fire station that physically cannot accommodate the apparatus capacity identified as necessary has become an operational limitation.
This does not mean taxpayers should write government a blank check. Major public investments should be questioned, scrutinized, and justified.
We believe the right questions are straightforward:
What is the problem? What risk does it create? What does the proposed investment fix? And what is the risk of leaving the problem unresolved?
Those are the questions we want to help Dallas residents answer.
DON'T TAKE OUR WORD FOR IT.
We want this website to be different.
You should not have to rely on a political advertisement, a social media post, or somebody else's interpretation of Proposition A to understand what is being proposed.
Throughout this site, we will provide the facts behind the five projects and make the underlying public documents and source materials available so you can examine them yourself.
No forty-point argument on a flyer.
No need to bury the important facts.
Just the issues, the documented conditions, the proposed solutions, and the questions Dallas should be asking.
DON'T TAKE OUR WORD FOR IT.
We want this website to be different.
You should not have to rely on a political advertisement, a social media post, or somebody else's interpretation of Proposition A to understand what is being proposed.
Throughout this site, we will provide the facts behind the five projects and make the underlying public documents and source materials available so you can examine them yourself.
No forty-point argument on a flyer.
No need to bury the important facts.
Just the issues, the documented conditions, the proposed solutions, and the questions Dallas should be asking.
HELP TELL THE STORY.
If you believe Dallas should have public safety infrastructure capable of supporting the city Dallas has become, we want to make it easy for you to participate in the conversation.
Our Resource Center provides downloadable social media graphics, flyers, postcards, fact sheets, and materials that residents, neighborhood organizations, and Dallas businesses can use and share.
Download them. Print them. Post them. Share them.
A GROWING CITY REQUIRES GROWING CAPABILITY.
Dallas should continue growing. We should welcome new residents, new businesses, new development, new investment, and new opportunities.
But growth carries responsibility.
The public safety professionals protecting a modern Dallas should not be asked to accomplish tomorrow's mission indefinitely with yesterday's infrastructure.
The city grew. The mission grew. The risk grew.
The infrastructure has to keep up.
DALLAS BUILT FOR TOMORROW
Growing City.
Stronger Infrastructure. Safer Tomorrow.
