Neighbors in Northwest Dallas have launched an effort to recall District 13 Councilmember Gay Donnell Willis, accusing her of siding with developers over homeowners in a string of contentious zoning fights. Organizers say the campaign grew out of disputes over at least three development proposals, including a tower project near Preston Road and Royal Lane and a condo development that would rise next to the Wimberley Court neighborhood along Walnut Hill Lane.
Recall supporters say the effort reflects Willis's unwillingness to work with homeowners opposed to the projects, according to NBC 5. The Preston/Royal tower development is currently before the Dallas City Council for an October 14 vote, and neighbors in both that case and the Walnut Hill project object to requests to raise the maximum allowed height of the proposed structures. Doug Hazelbaker, with the group Preserve Preston Hollow, said organizers plan to begin collecting more than 9,000 signatures in the coming weeks in hopes of putting the recall before voters on the May 2027 ballot — though a search-result snippet from the Dallas Morning News put that target at more than 9,500 signatures, a discrepancy the available reporting does not resolve.
What It Takes to Force a Recall Vote in Dallas
Getting a recall onto the ballot is no small task under Dallas City Code. Organizers must first have five registered voters from the council district notify the city secretary in writing on the day a petition is first circulated, and the petition itself must carry a general statement of the grounds for removal. From there, the clock starts: the group has only 60 days to gather signatures equal to at least 15% of the voters who were entitled to vote for that council seat in the last general municipal election, under the Dallas City Code.
Once a petition is filed, the city secretary has 30 days to examine it and determine whether it contains enough qualified signatures, per the same code. The Dallas Observer reported that District 13 had 52,791 registered voters as of 2017, meaning organizers would need to clear a signature threshold in the thousands — the campaign itself expects to collect at least 9,600, a figure in the same range cited by the Dallas Morning News and NBC 5's reporting.
Willis Defends Her Record on Zoning and City Hall
Willis has acknowledged the recall push and said she remains open to hearing from constituents. Speaking to NBC 5, she said: “I want everyone to know that I'm always available to listen and understand your viewpoint.” On the Preston Royal case specifically, she said the project is still moving through the city's standard review process and has already been revised because of neighbors' input, adding that no final decision has been made.
The recall campaign also points to Willis's support for relocating Dallas City Hall as a motivating factor, according to Hazelbaker, who said that position helped fuel the effort, as reported by the Dallas Observer. Willis has voted against a plan to repair the existing City Hall building and has said she does not regret backing relocation. She has also said she spent hundreds of hours meeting with residents, community groups, stakeholders, and city staff on the development disputes at the center of the recall.
A Parallel Push in Oak Cliff Targets Chad West
District 13 isn't the only council seat facing an organized recall attempt. Residents in District 1 have also announced their intent to recall Councilmember Chad West, who represents much of North Oak Cliff, citing his handling of up-zoning decisions and connections between Oak Cliff and downtown, per the Observer's reporting. That campaign, organized by Raymond Cantrell, has reported support from residents across the political spectrum and expects to collect more than 6,900 signatures, compared to the roughly 9,600 sought in the Willis campaign — a gap that tracks with District 1's smaller 2017 voter rolls of 35,282 registered voters versus District 13's 52,791.
West, who took office in 2019 and has won reelection in three separate cycles, is barred from seeking another term because of term limits and has said he is looking forward to finishing his final term on a standard timeline. He has noted that a successful recall would only affect the last five to six months of that term, since both his and Willis's current terms expire in 2027. Willis, unlike West, could seek reelection that year after winning in 2021, 2023, and 2025; her 2025 race drew 7,468 votes and had the highest turnout of any Dallas council district, according to the Observer.
Dallas Recalls Have a Long History of Falling Short
History is not on the side of either recall campaign. Dallas has never successfully recalled a sitting city council member before 1992, when Charlotte Mayes defeated Diane Ragsdale in a special recall election that cost the city more than $32,000, the Observer reported. Since then, recall efforts have repeatedly stalled before reaching voters: a 2017 attempt against former Councilmember Kevin Felder failed when organizers couldn't gather enough signatures, according to the Dallas Morning News, and three separate attempts to recall former Mayor Laura Miller in 2003, 2004, and 2005 also came up short.
A group of Dallas ministers claimed to have collected more than 72,800 signatures in a 2005 recall push before ultimately calling off the effort, per a Houston Chronicle account cited by the Morning News. More recently, a 2024 effort to recall Mayor Eric Johnson — filed by Davante Peters with the city secretary's office on January 5 of that year, with roughly 1,000 signatures gathered by January 9 — also failed to collect enough signatures to reach the ballot. SMU political scientist Cal Jillson has said the city's signature requirement is fairly steep, a characterization he offered to KERA.
Recall petitions cannot be signed online, which adds another hurdle for both the Willis and West campaigns as they turn to volunteers, events, and in the District 13 case, professional canvassers, to meet their deadlines. Joseph Beckham, involved in the District 1 effort, has said the recall process requires a heavy lift. Cantrell, the organizer behind the push against West, said residents have become increasingly willing to oppose both the councilmember and developer interests tied to Oak Cliff's zoning debates — even as the century-plus track record of failed Dallas recalls looms over both campaigns.
