Improving Public Safety in Downtown Dallas
Around 35 more Dallas police officers could be deployed downtown this summer in an effort to improve public safety in the heart of the city.
The enforcement boost would raise downtown police staffing to 130 officers — its highest level in a decade, officials said. That doesn’t include private security, public transportation officers, code enforcement and other city forces in the Central Business District, which covers the loop created by the Woodall Rogers Freeway, Interstates 35E and 30, U.S. 75 and I-345.
Members of a public-private partnership are unveiling an initiative to address public safety concerns and homelessness in downtown Dallas. The effort is aimed at attracting new economic opportunities and retaining and attracting downtown business and residents.
The Dallas Police Department pledged to house the officers in a new command center downtown. The city also wants to add up to 10 surveillance cameras and better coordinate with those already in place at private businesses and residences.
“You will feel the change in the way that we want to engage our different partners downtown,” Dominique Artis, Dallas’ chief of public safety, told The Dallas Morning News. “The mere fact that we want to make sure that we’re visible, that we have a place that, collectively, all of these different entities can talk about what we’re seeing downtown and then adjust our plans as need be.”
The Plan to Improve Public Safety
The effort is based on the premise that improving public safety downtown will lead to future citywide revitalization. The Dallas Police Department is working with the nonprofit Downtown Dallas Inc. in a public-private partnership with downtown stakeholders to drill down on issues that the neighborhood’s leaders believe hurt the area’s quality of life, including crime, public disorder and homelessness.
Artis pointed to crime data to support the deployment of more officers downtown. An analysis of police data from the sector that encompasses downtown showed a 3% drop in violence from 2020 to 2024. Overall crime climbed about 34.2% — for a total of 4,168 offenses in 2024, led by motor vehicle thefts, simple assaults and vandalism.
How the plan will be carried out is a complicated question.
The Dallas Police Department has been in a yearslong staffing crisis exacerbated by competition with other cities and high attrition rates. That means any reallocation of staff could take resources from other divisions or units. It’s a consideration Dallas’ former police brass have said they had to contend with in determining where to place officers.
Dallas police who are part of a Downtown task force talk with DART police officers at the DART Akard Station on Sunday, May 18, 2025, in Dallas. (Smiley N. Pool / Staff Photographer)
The downtown investment raises questions about whether that allocation of officers could take current or potential patrol staff away from neighborhoods grappling with higher levels of violence. At a time in which residents and elected city leaders have voiced hopes for faster police response times, requests for more police citywide have become more urgent.
“We all know that southern Dallas deserves the same urgency and investment as every other part of the city,” said council member Jaime Resendez, whose district includes most of Pleasant Grove. “Public safety must be rooted in equity, and I’ll keep pushing for a balanced, data-driven approach that treats every neighborhood fairly.”
Staffing and Training
Daniel Comeaux, who became Dallas’ police chief in April, said resources won’t be taken from other divisions for downtown. He said he’ll allocate new cadets there and referenced a recent graduating class. The department’s ramped-up hiring efforts have led to larger academy classes, with one in March made up of 41 officers — DPD’s largest graduate group since 2022.
Those ranks still need to go through months of “field training” — where they’re paired with veteran officers on the streets. That could happen downtown, but any influx of new officers to a division calls for more trainers there to accommodate them.
Another form of staffing could come from hiring retired officers in a part-time capacity.
Comeaux has told The News he believes there are officers with “gas left in a tank” that can provide for the city. He hopes to have them in place by the end of summer, but more details are expected to be ironed out in the coming months.
Community Concerns
Council member Carolyn King Arnold, whose district is in southern Dallas, said it’s important for downtown — as the city’s core and a key attraction — to feel safe, but she wants a review of officer staffing and an assessment of where crime data shows police should be working.
People feel safer if they see police, she said, adding residents want to feel confident that if they call 911, an officer will respond.
Dallas police work at a scene in the 2200 block of Main Street in the early morning hours of Sunday, May 18, 2025, in Dallas.
