Councilman Alan Warrick found himself between a rock and a hard place this week in council chambers.

The rock was the San Antonio Police Officers Association. In 2014, after Warrick pledged loyalty to the union’s cause in collective bargaining, SAPOA spent more than $50,000 to help him defeat his opponent and ascend to council in District 2.

The hard place was a contingent of Black Lives Matter activists. They heckled the African-American councilman as he tried to explain from the dais why he was voting for the city’s collective-bargaining agreement with the union.

Warrick’s flailing, emotional performance hinted at his vulnerability in next year’s election.

On Friday, Warrick told me he disagreed with this analysis, in part because Mayor Ivy Taylor has named some of the union’s critics to a new committee on police and community relations.

“If you look at the mayor’s committee, all of the people that were there (protesting the agreement) … are going to be part of this committee on community policing,” he said.

Some sought to kill the contract because it failed to reform disciplinary procedures for officers.

Warrick had decided to support the contract as far back as July, writing to Councilman Rey Saldaña: “I agree with the Mayor. We have a deal on the table that both parties are willing to sign.”

On Thursday, Warrick tried to justify his stance with statistics, asking Police Chief William McManus how many officers he had fired since 2005, and how many had won back their jobs.

McManus responded that 70 had been fired, and six had returned.

“So out of the 70, only six of them got their jobs back,” Warrick said. “That doesn’t sound like a blank check or no accountability to me.”

Deputy City Manager Erik Walsh quickly clarified: Out of the 70 fired, 17 were reinstated by McManus, five (not six) had won back their jobs and 13 were awaiting arbitration, where an arbitrator could overturn their terminations.

That added up to 35, or half of the officers fired.

Warrick tried another tack.

“So this contract doesn’t stop the chief from firing someone who goes through the process?” he asked.

This time, City Manager Sheryl Sculley clarified.

“You asked if the chief can fire,” she said. “Yes, he can, following the procedures. However, pursuant to the collective-bargaining agreement, there are things that he can use in that process and things that he cannot use. Likewise for the arbitrator.”

(Sculley has said she believes the disciplinary procedures need to be overhauled.)

Warrick tried again with a third argument — a controversial one, positing that “all lives” matter, not just “black lives.” He began reciting the names of 99 people who had died this year “from violence in our community.

“Who’s marching for them?” he asked. “Who’s crying for them? I know who’s crying for them. But I know who’s also there to clean up the mess that our society makes every time that one of those families loses their loved one. We have our police officers and our police officers association there to clean it up.

“We are voting on a contract to move our city forward,” he said.

“A bad contract,” someone yelled.

“The great Martin Luther King said …,” Warrick began, prompting more catcalls.

“I know that myself as a young person, even though it wasn’t said, I was afraid of police officers,” he continued. “As a black man in America, I appreciate your struggle. I was on the other side, but…”

“Stay on the other side,” someone suggested.

“I have to be here on this side of the dais, making decisions that move the entire city forward,” he responded.

“Don’t betray us,” someone said.

“It’s not a betrayal,” Warrick said, choking back emotion. “I can’t betray myself. I’m always going to be a black man whether I’m on council or not.”

It was a poignant moment, but not in the way that Warrick might have hoped.

He was elected to represent residents of a historically black district. In an era of heightened awareness of police brutality against minorities, he was siding with a police union for political reasons.

Yet his vote was a political miscalculation. Damned if you do and damned if you don’t, sometimes it’s better just to do the right thing.

bchasnoff@express-news.net