DALLAS — In a 16-page opinion released late Wednesday afternoon, the Texas Supreme Court ordered the City of Dallas to remove three of its charter amendments that were written to override three other ballot initiatives from a citizen-led group called Dallas HERO.
“The propositions contradict each other, and the ballot language as a whole will confuse and mislead voters because it does not acknowledge these contradictions,” the court opinion reads.
Dallas HERO successfully petitioned to put three proposals before Dallas voters on Nov. 5. If passed, they would change the city charter, which is akin to the city’s constitution.
The first requires Dallas to increase police pay and hire more officers. The second ballot measure puts the city manager on performance-based pay -- i.e., solve more problems and make more money. And the final charter amendment would allow citizens to sue city officials if they do not follow the law.
But Dallas City Council later approved its own three charter amendments that essentially said final control on how to allocate city money rests with the elected council.
Councilman Adam Bazaldua said the citizens elect and trust the council to conduct city business.
“I would consider them to be clarifying amendments more than anything,” Bazaldua told WFAA’s Inside Texas Politics last week.
But Dallas HERO sued the city over council's own amendments and, in a decision on Wednesday, the Supreme Court of Texas sided with the citizen-led group, ordering Dallas to drop its three ballot measures.
“It was extraordinary and rare relief because of an exceedingly egregious violation of law by Dallas city council,” said Pete Marocco, executive director of Dallas HERO, in a statement to WFAA. “The city council’s duplicitous attempt to thwart the will of the people was reckless, unlawful and disgraceful — it should be investigated by the inspector general and [council members] Bazaldua, [Omar] Narvaez and [Gay Donnell] Willis, [and] possibly others who conspired behind closed doors, should immediately resign.”
WFAA obtained the document and you can read the entire 16-page opinion below:
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who filed an amicus letter with the Texas Supreme Court on the Dallas HERO lawsuit, also praised the Texas Supreme Court ruling.
“I filed a letter in support of this citizen group’s lawsuit because government entities cannot plant confusing counter propositions on the ballot to mislead voters simply because the officials hope to see certain measures fail,” said Paxton.
"As disappointed as I am in the court’s ruling, I’m even more disappointed with the obvious political nature in which this ruling was made. I don’t find it coincidental that the funder of the propositions’ campaign is also a funder to all of our Texas Supreme Court justices’ campaigns. Now we will just wait to see what the voters decide and in the meantime, I will continue to educate and advocate against these egregious measures, which are misguided at best," Bazaldua told WFAA.
The city requires a minimum of 20,000 signatures to get a proposed amendment on the ballot. Dallas HERO says its three proposed amendments received 169,000 signatures.
With 55 days until the election, no organized opposition against the Dallas HERO amendments has materialized.
Bazaldua told Inside Texas Politics that he would push the city to sue if voters approve the Dallas HERO initiatives.
Ballots are to be printed in the coming days.
WFAA reached out the the City of Dallas for a comment on the decision.
"Thank you for reaching out. Because this involves litigation, the city has no comment."