After 10 years, Dallas' light-rail system is so successful, it's hard to imagine how close it came to foundering. As the Dallas Morning News recounted recently, the 45-mile rail system has begun reshaping its region. According to studies, developers have announced or built more than $3 billion in projects in DART rail corridors in the past decade. DART hauls 70,000 riders on weekdays and is already the fifth-largest light-rail system in the country. But it was almost not to be. DART spent its first few years drawing up plans, then asked voters in Dallas and its suburbs to dedicate a 1 percent sales tax. Some places came aboard quickly, but many of the smaller suburbs didn't. More alarming, a number of the places that approved DART in the mid-1980s questioned the decision later, which led to a number of "pullout" votes. Two of these referendums succeeded, resulting in Coppell and Flower Mound leaving DART in 1989. It all looks so foolish now, the fear that Texans were too wedded to their cars to take the sleek yellow and white trains to work, that DART would be a boondoggle, that it would take too long to build.
WHEN GOVERNMENTS GET DIVORCED
Newly incorporated Sandy Springs, Georgia (a suburb outside Atlanta), and its former spouse, Fulton County, haven't worked through their issues. The Fulton County commission recently voted to sell six parks in Sandy Springs to anyone offering top dollar. The county's commissioners say that Sandy Springs' exodus hurt the rest of the county (Sandy Springs received a healthy tax base), and the county must find ways of lessening its loss. As for Sandy Springs officials, their position is that they paid for these parks with their taxes over the last 50 years. The city will launch lawsuits and, if that doesn't work, go back to the legislature for a law forbidding the sale. Actually, returning to the legislature is a good idea. The legislature made a mess of Sandy Springs' incorporation by treating it as an isolated case. There are no general rules for unincorporated areas wishing to become cities of their own over a county's objections. What's needed is a process of incorporation, a key part of which would be a payment to the abandoned government for infrastructure improvements. Sometimes a little alimony goes a long way toward healing the bitterness of divorce.
POLICING WITHOUT POLICE
Researchers have established that simply putting more cops on city streets brings down crime, so it's hardly surprising that most cities would like to add police officers. But cops are expensive and budgets are tight. The answer for a growing number of places is some kind of civilian force. The latest big city to consider such a force is Houston, where Mayor Bill White is looking at hiring 35 or more "civilian traffic enforcers" to direct traffic, clear wrecks and maybe handle some accident investigations. These civilians would not be armed or have arrest powers, and they'd be limited to traffic enforcement, Houston's police chief said recently. The cost would be about $2.5 million per year, when the force is up and running. That's expensive, working out to about $70,000 per employee, but it's a bargain compared to sworn officers. There doesn't seem to be a commonly accepted rule of thumb for what it costs to train and equip a full-fledged officer, but one small department recently estimated its costs at $65,000, not counting salary or benefits. Cash-strapped San Diego is also thinking along these lines. The city council is considering hiring civilians to handle administrative duties at police headquarters--things such as human resources, technology management and code compliance, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported recently.
