{"id":233279,"date":"2025-09-17T07:28:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T07:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/233279\/"},"modified":"2025-09-17T07:28:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T07:28:09","slug":"mayor-eric-johnson-is-right-that-dallas-needs-a-cost-cutting-mindset","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/233279\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Eric Johnson is right that Dallas needs a cost-cutting mindset"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our differences with Mayor Eric Johnson are hardly a secret. <\/a><\/p>\n

We wish he had set a better example of consistent leadership <\/a>and vision throughout his tenure, instead of focusing so much on his broader political ambitions.<\/a><\/p>\n

But it is what it is, and there are times when the mayor deserves credit <\/a>for at least attempting to set a clear path for the council to follow.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s what he did in issuing a memo Sept. 12 urging council members to focus on finding savings within the city budget. We need a mindset that every dollar counts, not that every dollar must be spent.<\/p>\n

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Johnson\u2019s proposal is modest. Ditch the cost of city-funded lobbyists at $339,000 a year and reallocate federal ARPA funds from a library branch that needs to close to park and recreation programs.<\/p>\n

Johnson is right that Dallas\u2019 lobbyists, all from the left, are not influential<\/a> with the state\u2019s top powerbrokers. And he\u2019s right that using federal funds as a Band-Aid for the Skillman Southwestern Library Branch,<\/a> which just about everyone understands needs to close, is a waste of resources. <\/p>\n

His amendment would save the city more than $725,000, according to his figures. He called on each council member to approach the budget with a savings mindset. If they did that, we might be able to nudge the tax rate even lower than the 0.5-cent reduction City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert is proposing.<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s memo supports Tolbert\u2019s budget, and we think the council largely agrees that she did a good job of managing spending to increase public safety funding while also bringing the tax rate down slightly.<\/p>\n

There is more work to be done, however, in a city that has so many employees, services and programs that are underutilized or that serve very narrow constituencies. <\/p>\n

City Hall is not now and never will be equipped to provide broad social services. It is best suited to ensuring core services, from public safety to streets to clean water, are well provided. It has its hands full with that work alone.<\/p>\n

As the council takes up the annual budget in a briefing today, we hope council members will see this as an opportunity not to spend but to save. Our tax rate has ballooned because past councils too often have failed to recognize that City Hall can\u2019t do it all. Nor should it.<\/p>\n

Johnson has done too little to build necessary trust around the horseshoe to push his plan forward. But we hope his fellow council members will at least hear him out on the need to make small trims here and there in the expectation that, taken together, they will add up to a leaner and more efficient city government.<\/p>\n

We welcome your thoughts in a letter to the editor. See the guidelines and <\/b>submit your letter here<\/b><\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n

If you have problems with the form, you can submit via email at <\/b>letters@dallasnews.com<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Our differences with Mayor Eric Johnson are hardly a secret. We wish he had set a better example…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":233280,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,3232,1596,14840,14841,6083,39778,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-233279","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-budget","10":"tag-dallas","11":"tag-dallas-city-council","12":"tag-dallas-city-hall","13":"tag-editorials","14":"tag-eric-johnson","15":"tag-texas","16":"tag-tx","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115218461785542872","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}