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The recent International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) Conference was a huge success for CrimeReports. While there, we did hundreds of demonstrations of CrimeReports and our robust analytics tool, Command Central. Especially cool was the use of an interactive smartboard for our Command Central demonstrations. Playing around with it makes you feel like Tom Cruise in Minority Report. Check out Command Central’s sweet features in the video below.
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
From GIS in Education:
The 2009 “cool schools” ranking listed 135 colleges and universities across the U.S. that are considered “Greenest Universities.” judged to be doing the most to help the planet. The judging was based from efficiency, energy, food usage, academics, purchasing, transportation, waste, and administration.
ESRI GIS Education has come up with the “Greenest Universities” database that you can download for free and map patterns that you want to see and study yourself.
Download the full data set (.zip) here: http://edcommunity.esri.com/arclessons/disclaimer.cfm?DLfile=green_univs.gdb.zip
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Check out the latest video of CrimeReports in action. (Keep an eye out for the sweet smart board they use with Command Central—it’s like we’re in the movie Minority Report.)
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
I just saw that Stockholm, Sweden, now has a crime map. (Of course, the website is in Swedish, but that’s what Google Translator is for.) The site only lists 99 crimes for the last 2 months, but I imagine that if the map grows in popularity and local law enforcement sees the benefits of a public crime map, more and more information will appear.
Right now, the map is just a basic Google Map with only one marker type, and it’s not searchable, or filterable. But you can click a marker to find out more details about an incident; however, if you don’t speak Swedish, you might have to take your laptop to IKEA and see if you can get some help.
Check out the map here: http://eskapism.se/stockholmcrimemap/
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Las Vegas, Nevada, has recently experienced a drop in crime, like much of the rest of the country. Some areas around the country attribute the drop in crime to the current state of the economy and others take credit for innovative crime-fighting initiates. But according to a recent story out of Las Vegas, the local police are crediting their drop in crime to the use of new technology, including crime mapping, and changes in their philosophy toward policing.
Has your agency thought about public-facing crime mapping? Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
A recent article posted at The Christian Science Monitor, reports that nearly a year after the massive anti-crime protests in Mexico, little has changed to curb crime or to improve relations between citizens and law enforcement. In fact, many residents feel that the crime has gotten worse.
Originally, as a result of the protests, the government promised to “root out corrupt police moonlighting for kidnapping rings, better coordinate police actions, and create more citizen watch groups.” And although the government says it has accomplished its goals, citizens still feel unsafe.
Overcoming a Culture of Not Reporting Crime
The real problem, pointed out by one citizen, is not police corruption itself, but rather Mexico’s culture of not reporting crime. Many citizens do not report crime out of fear of retaliation from criminals, or fear that the police that they report to are corrupt and won’t pay attention anyway. The article points out that as much as 80% of crime goes unreported.
What exists, then, is a massive lack of trust between citizens and law enforcement. This mistrust leads to a culture of fear toward law enforcement. Just like any neighborhood in the United States, if citizens fear the police, they will not work with them to reduce crime—or even report it. The problem of mistrust, then, is the root of the problem.
Quelling Fear Through Anonymity and Technology
Fear and mistrust are bred from secrecy. One of the ways that Mexico can encourage citizens to trust police is to open up crime data to the public. Illuminemos (“Light Up Mexico”), an organization dedicated to reducing crime in Mexico, has reportedly published a crime map to combat the lack of information from police (although, I have not been able to find it). Nevertheless, public-facing crime mapping could prove a useful public relations tool for a government trying to instill its citizens with trust in law enforcement. Pushing actual crime data to a publicly available site not only gives citizens the information they need to track crime and protect themselves, but opening the data up to the public shows that the government trust the public with the information. If the government offers an olive branch, through public-facing crime mapping, they prove that they are not hiding anything and that they are actively seeking citizen participation in reducing crime.
In addition, some citizens do not report crime for fear of retaliation. CiviRep, a pioneering SMS crime reporting system has been deployed in Venezuela (read more about it here). The system allows citizens to use cell phones to anonymously report crime from any location. The crime info is sent to local police who can respond and map crime in real time. A similar system, deployed in Mexico, could help quell the fear of retaliation and increase crime reporting dramatically.
Deployment
Granted, there are some technological issues to overcome in deploying public crime mapping and text message crime reporting. For instance, because addresses in Mexico are not clearly defined or regulated, mapping by address could be a problem, forcing police to map crime by GPS coordinates. In addition, the money may not be available to build or maintain these systems. However, working toward these technological solutions to reduce crime and create openness could provide a positive return on investment for citizens and the Mexican government
UPDATE: The Illuminemos map can be found here: http://www.mapadelincuencial.org.mx/zonas_de_riesgo.php (Thanks to reader lewis shepherd for the tip)
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Adoption of open-data initiatives by law enforcement spurs widespread interest in public crime-mapping solutions
Today, St. Petersburg, Fla., becomes the 500th law enforcement agency to share crime data with the public through CrimeReports.com, the world leader in online crime mapping. St. Petersburg joins other forward-thinking agencies like Los Angeles County, Washington DC, Boston, Baltimore, Omaha, Portland, and 499 other communities of all sizes across North America that have chosen to inform and engage their citizens through timely, block-level crime data. As well, nearly 100 additional agencies have signed onto to the CrimeReports network in the past 90 days and will appear on the map in the coming weeks.
“We look forward to building stronger relationships with citizens, as we share crime information and work together to prevent and reduce crime in our community,” said Chief Charles Harmon. “CrimeReports is enabling us to get crime information to our citizens quickly, easily, and affordably.”
The city’s 250,000 residents can now more fully benefit from the St. Petersburg Police Department’s continued commitment to cutting–edge technology and community outreach efforts. And local neighborhood watch efforts have gained an invaluable tool that will enable them to work more closely with officers to keep their communities safe.
Law enforcement agencies across the country are increasingly turning to web 2.0 technology and social networking tools to fulfill the Obama administration’s call for innovation through more open data at all levels of government and law enforcement. This rapid adoption of open-data initiatives has pushed CrimeReports to the front of the online crime-mapping industry.
“Not only is this a milestone for CrimeReports, but our growth is indicative of a larger push by law enforcement agencies to inform and communicate with their communities,” said Greg Whisenant, founder and CEO of CrimeReports. “We simply supply law enforcement agencies with cost-effective, easy-to-use tools to accomplish their goals.”
CrimeReports launched in mid-2007, with only one law-enforcement partner. Today, it is the largest and most-comprehensive online crime-mapping service in the world. CrimeReports’ innovative solutions have allowed law enforcement agencies to communicate with local citizens more cost-effectively than any other solution on the market. And with a recent $7.2 million joint funding infusion from Austin Ventures and vSpring Capital, CrimeReports is expanding its offerings with Command Central, a powerful crime-analytics tool for law enforcement agencies and will introduce other web-based law enforcement and community watch tools in the near future.
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Law Enforcement News Center recently published an article declaring CrimeReports a leader in online crime mapping. Of course, we’re happy to be at the forefront of a shift in law enforcement communication, away from slower print media, and toward online crime mapping and email alerts.
We want to thank all of our over 500 law enforcement partners across the US and Canada for their continued support and efforts to give their citizens the information they need to keep their neighborhoods safe.
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Hazelwood, Missouri, Chief of Police, Carl Wolf was recently interviewed on the local Fox affiliate about his department’s recent decision to partner with CrimeReports. Watch the video below.
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “Hazelwood Chief Talks About CrimeReports“, posted with vodpod
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Following in the footsteps of the federal government with data.gov and recovery.org, San Francisco joins other states and cities across the US who are opening up their data for public access and free use. Not only is the city opening up crime data, but also other information on highways, bridges, trees, post offices, and more.
Go to DataSF.org to check out the full, downloadable datasets.
Get on the crime map at CrimeReports.com
Stumble It!
The Crime Map 