An ACORN Sprouts in Dallas

Having a name like ACORN isn’t a bad start for a grass roots reform group which is intent on growing into a political force in Dallas. Since arriving in Dallas 18 months ago, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now has grown to include 10 neighborhood chapters totalling 2,000 dues-paying members. Council members and other elected officials aren’t exactly quaking in their boots at the thought of ACORN’s presence, yet the organization does show some political promise. If ACORN’s track record after seven years in its native Arkansas is any indication of what might eventually happen in Dallas, this group is worth watching.

Today in Arkansas ACORN members sit on city councils or county boards in Little Rock, Hot Springs, Fort Smith and Pine Bluff – four of Arkansas’ five largest cities. ACORN founder Wade Rathke estimates that his organization politically controls two of Little Rock’s five wards, and that it can assemble a bloc vote of perhaps three to four thousand ACORN members, easily enough to swing a close Little Rock election.

The point was proved dramatically in Little Rock last November when an ACORN-sponsored initiative passed handily 26,000 to 21,000. The ordinance lowered residential electric rates for most users 20 to 40 percent, while raising the rates for large, industrial customers. (The ordinance hasn’t been implemented because of pending lawsuits filed by Arkansas Power & Light and seven Little Rock industries.)

ACORN is actively pursuing a number of issues in Dallas, ranging from fighting utility rate increases to tossing porno theaters and nude modeling studios out of East Dallas. Its constituency is largely low income residents who are frustrated at not having a voice in local politics. ACORN didn’t make a good showing in its first appearance before the City Council more than a year ago, at which three ACORN members read prepared statements blasting a rumored utility rate hike. Councilmen John Lee-dom and Bill Nicol immediately cut the nervous speakers to pieces, demanding to know who wrote their speeches and what outside organizer came into Dallas to help assemble this mysterious group.

In fact ACORN really was brought into Dallas by a full-time, paid professional organizer, Steve Holt, a 26-year-old Harvard graduate. Holt was dispatched from Arkansas to organize an ACORN chapter in Dallas, which he began doing in September, 1975.

Since the day Leedom and Nicol needled the speakers so successfully, ACORN has learned a lot, namely that presentations loaded with facts work better than those speeches teeming with emotional assaults on a utility company. Recently ACORN members went before the City Council to present a study on red-lining, backed by data gathered from 70 local lending institutions. Speakers also presented a 12-point plan to fight the practice of redlining – the refusal to make home improvement loans available to deteriorating neighborhoods. The study made the front page of the Sunday Dallas Morning News, scoring more points for ACORN. (The News had helped gather the data.)

ACORN membership is strongest in the council districts of Bill Nicol, Rose Renfroe and Willie Cothrum. At least Nicol and Renfroe aren’t enthralled with ACORN’s mission. “I think they come up with some pretty good ideas and I listen to them.” Nicol said, “but they could come to me individually and accomplish the same thing.” Nicol also is somewhat suspicious of Holt. “He gets a group together and charges them $16 a year to bring neighborhood issues before the Council. Now here’s a Harvard graduate who comes to Dallas to live on a small salary while organizing these people. That just doesn’t make any sense,” Nicol added.

Rose Renfroe says some people in her district “resent the fact that ACORN people knock on their door and charge them so much a month to represent them before the Council. I think they’re insulting some people in my district by suggesting that they can’t come directly to me.”

Ultimately, Holt explains. ACORN would like to become a persuasive force in Dallas elections, just as it has in Arkansas. Councilman Willie Cothrum doubts that ACORN can do it. He points out that most Council districts have diverse populations which would make it very difficult for ACORN to gain significant voter strength with only its low income constituency. “I just don’t see the numbers there,” Cothrum said.

ACORN is likely to continue growing in Dallas, much as it has in five other states – Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Missouri and South Dakota. But don’t look for Dallas membership to turn overnight into an electoral powerhouse. As founder Rathke puts it, “I don’t think any Dallas politicians are worrying about having to put on ACORN buttons.”