Dallas is starting its budget work early this year, with a sobering insight Wednesday from its finance chief, Jack Ireland: “When everything is a priority, nothing is a priority.”
Ireland and other city officials walked the City Council through a priority-based budgeting approach that forces departments, and council members, to rank what matters most and what can wait.
City officials plan a voluntary survey of council members to identify key goals and spending targets.
Among the questions: whether council members want to maintain employee support programs at current staffing levels, scale them back or eliminate them along with staff. Other questions will focus on the tax rate and the level of city services.
The process, led by City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert, leans heavily on community surveys, town halls, staff feedback and the council’s eventual consensus.
Dallas is coming off a record-setting budget cycle. The current fiscal year plan totals about $5.2 billion, the largest in city history, with roughly $1.9 billion in the general fund that pays for police, fire, libraries, parks and other core services.
But some of the methods to help draft the next budget drew friction.
Council member Cara Mendelsohn called the city’s polling format “juvenile” and questioned its transparency, saying it could be used to box in council members later in the process.
Others, including Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Gay Donnell Willis, said the polling reflects a broader lack of clear direction from the City Council as affordability pressures rise.
City staffers said the results could shape decisions on services such as libraries and pools, as well as recreation fees, signaling visible tradeoffs for residents.
Council members also pointed to growing affordability pressures, including the challenge of paying city workers a living wage. Willis noted that only a third of the city’s employees live in Dallas, underscoring the strain because of higher housing costs.