Mayor Johnson says Dallas doesn't "have a revenue problem", AI is the way forward for efficiency and cost savings
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson said AI will help the city reduce the number of employees it needs.
"Data center debate aside, we've got to get comfortable with the idea that AI is going to be something that is going to benefit the taxpayers of Dallas in the long run," said Johnson. "We're going to have to become more efficient with everything we do around here, and AI is going to be able to help us with that."
He went on to say, "I do see city government getting smaller ... in a personnel sense."
Johnson made the remarks in an exclusive interview with CBS News Texas on Thursday, one day before City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert released her proposed 2026-27 budget, which calls for eliminating nearly 300 positions to save more than $17 million.
When asked whether AI will contribute to reducing the number of employees, Johnson said, "It already is, and it's going to have to contribute even more."
One area where Johnson said artificial intelligence could help is procurement, evaluating which companies the city does business with. "We ask for volumes and volumes of information, and we've got human beings just poring over volumes of information that could be fed to an AI-supported computer to help us analyze a lot faster, and frankly, make fewer mistakes and be more efficient about it," he said. "You just need human beings to check the work."
Mayor Eric Johnson has said for years that the city of Dallas has needed to defund the bureaucracy and right-size its government operations.
"We really should have been slowing down the growth of government all this time. Like, it's grown too much, and it's gotten into too many things," said Johnson.
Governor Greg Abbott has blamed spending by local governments for keeping property taxes higher than they should be. During campaign events, he has said he wants lawmakers to clamp down on local governments when the new legislative session begins in January. Mayor Johnson said he doesn't like other forms of government telling city leaders how to do their jobs, but he said he understands why state leaders are saying that.
"I think what Austin understands, because I look at these numbers, is that city governments don't have a revenue problem," said Johnson. "We don't have a revenue problem. Like I've said, we've added $30 billion to our city's tax base since I took office. $30 billion."
Johnson entered office in 2019.
He went on to say, "I think state government understands you've got plenty of money, but you're choosing to spend it all. You're choosing to go out and tax to the limit that you can, as opposed to thinking about how you can return that value to your residents."
Johnson said his top priorities are public safety and cutting the property tax rate as much as possible -- as long as it doesn't impact public safety.
On Friday evening, the city manager released her proposed budget. The general fund is $2.04 billion, an increase of $80.2 million or 4.1% from this year's budget. The city said nearly all of that growth will be directed to the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire-Rescue budgets.
Under the proposal, the property tax rate would drop by 10 cents to 69.78 cents per $100 valuation.
Right now, city administrators are negotiating with the police and fire associations over a new meet-and-confer contract.
Johnson said, "I'm confident that we'll get there. We always do. I think that the associations have a job to do, and I respect them very much. I've been supported by them for my entire career here for a reason. I think they know my heart is with public safety and with our first responders, and we are going to honor our commitments to them. That's what makes this situation with city finances challenging, because public safety is just such a large part of our budget. Honestly, it's going to become even larger over time."
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