The Dallas police chief is asking ministers to help combat a spike in the city's murder rate, meanwhile voters get a say in the situation when they go to the polls in Saturday's runoff election for a new Dallas mayor.
Dallas Police Chief U. Renee Hall will host a community meeting Thursday at 6:30 p.m. at the Martin Luther King Recreation Center at 2901 Pennsylvania Avenue. She invited ministers and community leaders to attend.
Reverend Ronald Wright is a civil rights activist and frequent critic of police. Wednesday, he asked residents to help police solve recent murders, while speaking as a guest on KHVN's noon talk show.
"If you don't say nothing, the next time it very well could be you," Wright told listeners. "And the way things are going now, the next time it very well could be you. And so we're going to have to stand together, open our mouths about what is going on, and when we start doing things about what is happening to us, then everybody else don't have a choice."
Wright said churches could also work to boost families that are struggling, to keep young people away from crime.
"Our churches need to understand that God's property don't stop at the alter table, and we need to get out and bring our families back together so we can educate and teach our families," he said.
The nearly 100 murders so far this year in Dallas is a huge topic in Saturday's runoff election for a new mayor.
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City councilman Scott Griggs and state Rep. Eric Johnson differed in their descriptions of the situation Wednesday at a Dallas Rotary Club forum.
"I believe in being honest with the people of Dallas. This is a public safety crisis," Griggs said.
Johnson said it was a "challenge." During his campaign Johnson said calling the situation a "public safety crisis" discourages the economic development Dallas needs to raise money to pay for improvements in public safety.
"We have a public safety challenge on our hands that we have to meet, but we've met every challenge we've ever had in this city," Johnson said.
He said he would use his experience to confront the situation as he has done with other big issues.
"Identify who the relevant people are who have the expertise, sit down with them and come up with a plan to reallocate resources, reconfigure the homicide department and allocate more resources to homicide and make sure we get this under control immediately. Because job number one of any government is protecting citizens and making it safe," Johnson said.
Griggs said he would immediately push a substantial increase in public safety pay -- beyond the $60,000 a year Dallas increased it to this year.
"To attract and retain, we need to go closer to $72,000 and have some of the top paid officers in North Texas, and I'm prepared to do that," Griggs said. "We've got to increase our pay and benefits so that officers will want to lateral into the city of Dallas, so we won't just rely on the Dallas Police Academy to build up our uniform strength."
Johnson has questioned where Griggs would find enough money to pay for the higher salaries and additional officers.
Dallas currently has around 700 officers fewer than its peak of 3,690 in 2011.
Four city council seats will also be decided in Saturday's runoff election.
