Grumet: Year after Uvalde shooting, DPS Director Steve McCraw's $45,000 raise doesn't add up

Certain numbers come to mind when I think of Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw.

The 21 people — 19 kids and two teachers — killed last year in Uvalde, in the deadliest school shooting in Texas history.

The 77 minutes that dozens of DPS troopers and other officers stood around, failing to stop that massacre.

The singular pledge that McCraw made to resign if the DPS had “any culpability” for that horribly delayed response — and then his refusal last fall to step down, even as outraged family members and several elected officials urged him to.

After all of that, a surprising new figure is attached to McCraw:

A $45,437 raise.

That 15% raise, recently approved by the state’s Public Safety Commission, brings McCraw’s annual salary to $345,250 — making him one of the highest paid department heads for the state of Texas.

“We are truly fortunate to have somebody of the caliber of Steve McCraw as director of the Department of Public Safety, and we cannot pay you enough to do this important job,” Public Safety Commission chair Steven P. Mach said Aug. 24, as the board raised McCraw’s pay. “So thank you for what you're doing.”

The sizable raise is stunning by any measure. It’s more than the standard raise that rank-and-file troopers and other state employees are receiving (5% or $3,000, whichever is higher, both this year and the next).

Plus, this boost to McCraw’s pay comes only a year after the 2022 shooting in Uvalde, a tragedy defined by “systemic failures and egregious poor decision making,” according to a House report released last year. The raise comes as the American-Statesman and other media outlets continue to fight in court for the DPS records that would provide the full picture of the agency’s response that day, information Texans deserve.

Maybe see how that shakes out before showering a raise on the chief?

Moreover, the Public Safety Commission — all appointees of Gov. Greg Abbott — went straight to the maximum salary figure allowed. McCraw previously earned $299,813. A provision on Page 878 in the Legislature’s 1,030-page General Appropriations Act made the DPS director eligible for a salary of up to $345,250 — but nothing required commissioners to go to the max. They chose to.

(Through a DPS spokeswoman, McCraw declined to comment on criticisms about his raise.)

Sen. Roland Gutierrez blasted the commission for providing “a raise for a man who has done nothing but lie about the failed response to the Robb (Elementary) shooting.”

“The families shattered by the Uvalde massacre deserve accountability,” the San Antonio Democrat told me via email, “but instead, the broken political system shelters McCraw and his failures. For 77 minutes, this man kept 91 Department of Public Safety troopers from entering that classroom and saving those children."

I should note that McCraw has pointed the finger at Pete Arredondo, the Uvalde school district police chief who was fired last year. When the DPS wrapped up its internal review of its own troopers’ actions, it had fired only one officer and was working to fire another.

Accountability for this tragedy remains in short supply.

Perhaps you’re thinking: Uvalde, horrific as it was, represented one moment for a massive statewide agency that does many other things. McCraw’s salary should reflect the skills needed to run such a large and complex organization.

Indeed, he has an incredibly challenging job, running a statewide law enforcement agency that handles everything from highway patrol to Abbott’s border security mission. But I keep thinking about some of the other people affected by some of that work.

The 133 migrants treated for razor wire injuries this summer at the U.S.-Mexico border, according to reporting by the Houston Chronicle, which first reported a DPS trooper warning his superiors that Operation Lone Star had “stepped over a line into the inhumane.”

The people of color who accounted for 9 out of 10 DPS arrests in Austin when the agency provided help patrolling the city earlier this year, even though the city’s population is only 48% nonwhite.

Even folks trying to do one of life’s most mundane tasks — renew their driver’s license at a DPS office — who face long waits for an appointment or long lines if they’re desperate enough to seek same-day service.

This is an agency with serious problems to address. Yet no matter the troubling revelations about the DPS, McCraw is given praise and a raise.

The buck doesn’t stop with McCraw. But the big bucks do.

Grumet is the Statesman’s Metro columnist. Her column, ATX in Context, contains her opinions. Share yours via email at bgrumet@statesman.com or via Twitter at @bgrumet. Find her previous work at statesman.com/news/columns.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Year after Uvalde school shooting, DPS Director's raise doesn't add up