Paula Blackmon
It’s a catchy name — “Paula-tics” — by neighborhood council person Paula Blackmon leading a video discussion about the City of Dallas budget process and how to make the City more responsive to residents’ priorities.
Blackmon invited several of what she describes as a diverse group of “East Dallas neighborhood leaders and opinion makers” to participate in the discussion, along with Advocate chief revenue officer Rick Wamre (yours truly). The group exchanged ideas about City issues as they were captured by a professional film crew at Lakewood Growler, Mockingbird and Abrams.
With everyone mic’ed up and ready to talk tax rates, City staffing and spending, and how to rein in City spending while still focusing on the neighborhood instrastructure and quality-of-life issues residents say they want prioritized, Blackmon led a lengthy discussion that has been edited down here.
Among those you’ll find sharing their opinions: Randall Bryant, chair of the Dallas Black Chamber of Commerce; Felix Saucedo, neighborhood resident and trail advocate; Bea Martinez, a neighborhood resident and activist; Leigh Ann Ellis, a neighborhood resident and former Dallas ISD trustee; and Keri Mitchell, neighborhood resident and founder of the Dallas Free Press publications in South and West Dallas (and a former Advocate editor).
The City priorities video is a bit longer than many readers’ typical attention spans for news, but if you take a look and want to send me your thoughts, comments and ideas, email me at rwamre@advocatemag.com. And if you have story ideas or City issues you would like to see covered, let me know about those, too.
Blackmon is using office-holder (non-City) money to produce these videos. She’s planning a series of future video stories, partnering with us at the Advocate to tell the stories of neighborhood residents and issues in a unique way.
Coming soon: a story about how neighborhood fentanyl use has impacted one neighborhood family and what the City is doing to combat the problem. Among future potential topics: What is the City’s “brand”, and a briefing on the upcoming City bond issue.
