Don't Houston My Dallas: Brochure for next city manager features wrong skyline photo

A widely circulated draft version of a brochure advertising Dallas’ opening for a new city manager features Houston on the cover.

It’s one of several issues a city council committee tasked a hired consultancy group to address in the next week as part of its contract to lead a national search for Dallas’ top-paying job.

The Ad Hoc Committee on Administrative Affairs, comprised of five city council members, reviewed the proposed brochure Monday, with representatives of Baker Tilly.

District 12 Councilmember Cara Mendelsohn said the first thing that grabbed her attention was the cover photo, and not in the intended way.

“I’m just going to say first off I hate this photo,” Mendelsohn said. “I don’t think it’s representative of Dallas.”

As the meeting continued, several members of the committee honed on problems with the cover photo.

“To me this looks old and dated,” District 2 Councilmember Jesse Moreno said.

The Dallas City Council awarded in May an approximately $134,000 contract to Baker Tilly to handle the national search for the city manager opening.

T.C. Broadnax left earlier this year for the same job in Austin.

Interim city manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert hasn’t officially indicated she will seek the permanent position but has made significant changes to the internal structure and functioning of several city departments in her first 100 days.

Councilmembers on Monday said the latest draft version, at eight pages, is too long and can be edited down for clarity while emphasizing attributes unique to Dallas to attract the best candidate pool.

Councilmember Paul Ridley says that work begins on the front of the brochure with a photo he also urged needed to be changed.

“Reunion Tower and the Pegasus, those have to be in the photograph,” Ridley said.

Councilmember Tennell Atkins chairs the committee and told NBC 5 after the meeting he didn’t know for sure which city was on the cover but wanted to see changes.

“I don’t know where they got the picture from, but all we’re saying is that picture doesn’t represent the city of Dallas,” Atkins said. “When we look at it, my eyes, your eyes, everybody’s eyes that look at it, you say ‘Hey, this is not representing the city of Dallas’.”

“I didn’t know it was Houston but that’s kind of disturbing,” Mendelsohn said after learning the wrong city was on the draft cover. “I would want them (Baker Tilly) to be uniquely working on our project, I think they are. Hopefully, they’re focused on the content.”

Representatives from Baker Tilly told the committee it could resubmit a new version of the brochure by Wednesday, which Atkins said would allow time for the committee to review it before publishing it for candidates on September 3.

The firm did not immediately respond to NBC 5 when asked if it was aware another city was being used on the cover of the Dallas city manager brochure project.

Atkins has indicated the goal is for the city council to hire a new city manager by the end of the year.