There's still some work to be done, however. While overall violent crime has decreased, murders and aggravated assaults are up in Dallas, according to a report on the Dallas Police Department’s violent crime plan released last week.
Michael Smith, a University of Texas at San Antonio criminology and criminal justice professor, walked Dallas’ public safety committee through the report on Monday. Created by researchers at UTSA, it's an evaluation ofn how the plan has gone over the last two years.
DPD Police Chief Eddie Garcia described violent crime reduction as lowering the temperature across the city. “The police department is a fever reducer. We’re not a cure to the illness,” Garcia said. “We’re doing our very best to reduce the fever.”
Overall, the city saw a 15.3% decrease in average violent street crime incidents since the crime plan was implemented between May 2021 and April 2023, when compared to the previous 36 months (May 2018 – April 2021.) The number of victims of violent crime also fell by 8% when compared to the previous three years.
The number of murder and aggravated assault victims has declined every year since the start of the crime plan when compared to previous years before implementation (May 2019 – April 2020.) However, according to the report, periodic spates of multiple victim murders and aggravated assaults have resulted in an approximate 10% increase in the average number of victims since the start of the crime plan when compared to averages of the three years prior to the crime plan implementation.
The department has also seen increases in the number of murders and aggravated assaults while other cities have seen decreases. There was a 9.3% increase in murders and a 10.1% increase in aggravated assaults when compared with the years before the crime plan was implemented, for example.
Most of this violent crime occurs in and around older apartment complexes, Smith said. Because of this, the report suggests a comprehensive citywide strategy to address conditions at older apartment complexes that may give rise to violent crime. Approaches could include zoning changes, code compliance, recreation and other investments or incentives that could help reduce violent crime.“We’re doing our very best to reduce the fever.” – Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia
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“In a way, I wish that we could roll the clock back 50 years and think about how we might imagine apartment complexes being constructed,” Smith said.
City Council member Cara Mendelsohn suggested an ordinance that would require apartment complexes over a certain age that have experienced certain levels of crime to take steps like installing fencing, cameras or extra lighting. Smith said this is the kind of thing he would recommend the city look into.
DPD’s hot spot policing has seen the most success, with some of the biggest reductions in violent crime and arrests. Violent crime in the city’s hot spots decreased by more than 30% when compared to averages from years prior. This hot spot policing strategy even had effects on neighboring areas, with some surrounding areas experiencing a violent crime decrease of 9%. Arrests in the city are also decreasing. Citywide, and in treated hot spot areas, arrests fell by 14% and 11%, respectively. Arrests for violent crime, citywide, saw a smaller decrease of 4%. But these arrests increased in hot spots by 25%. Gun arrests also saw substantial increases of 28% citywide and 55% in DPD’s hot spots.
In the spring of 2022, DPD put together what is called a place network investigations (PNI) team to investigate high-crime areas in the city. The department looked at the team’s work in three of the city's PNI locations: 3550 E. Overton Road in southern Dallas, and 11760 Ferguson Road and 11511 Ferguson Road in northeast Dallas. At the Overton Road site, there was some evidence that numbers of violent crime, violence victims and calls for service were lower when compared to months before the place network investigations team started its work.
While the place network investigations team has shown some success at reducing violent crime, the report said that implementation has been hampered by a lack of coordination across city departments, and it heavily relied on traditional policing as opposed to multidisciplinary solutions as originally intended. If Dallas wants to see more success out of its place network investigations team, there will need to be more coordination across city departments.
The report suggested the need for a systemwide effort to address the revolving door of arrest, release on bail/bond and re-arrest, particularly among an increasingly youthful population of violent offenders.
Other major cities are also seeing reductions in violent crime, and even in murders. In Fort Worth, for example, murder and manslaughter was down by about 32% in the first quarter of the year when compared with the same period last year. Aggravated assaults also fell by 2.5%, according to a crime report by the Fort Worth Police Department. Fort Worth attributed its success to a program called FortWorthSafe. As part of the program, the city’s police department uses neighborhood cameras and works with other city departments to remove blight and increase the quality of life in high-crime neighborhoods.
In Houston, overall violent crime was down by about 8% and murders decreased by about 22%. The Houston Police Department attributed the reductions to an initiative called Safe Houston. The initiative, funded by the American Rescue Plan Act, saw increased officer street presence and a focus on the city’s high-crime areas.
Despite the challenges Dallas faces, Mendelsohn said she is happy with the department and the results of its violent crime reduction plan.
“I am very proud of the efforts of our officers and command staff in implementing the violent crime plan,” Mendelsohn told the Observer. “They have had remarkable results, especially considering the decreasing number of officers, national trends for urban areas, and challenges described in the [UTSA] 2-year report.”
