WHAT POLICE DEPARTMENTS REPORT

Last class

Police authorizing environmentDemands are: More/less consistent More/less persistent More/less coherent

The Organizational ScoreboardWhat do police generally report to overseers?(1) Resources: expenditures and

employees(2) Activities: UCR crimes, arrests, etc.

What PDs report (and how) varies quite a bit across locations

Police have tremendous discretion in how transparent to make their organizations

Corporate Reporting

How are private businesses expected to report? On a quarterly basis Consistently based on regulations and

agreed upon best practices Reports are certified by an independent

third party Nothing close to this in public policing

Current reporting practices in policing

Key distinctions:(1) Who produced/certified the report Police, outside auditor, external reviewer

(2) Scope/Coverage Organization or subunit Annual reports/Management reports Strategic plans

Annual Reports

Those by police: What performance measures are represented? Levels of crime and arrests Other values not typically reportedThose by outside auditors: What performance measures are represented? Use of authorityWhat does this suggest? Police report on accomplishments, but do not

own up to the costs they impose in doing so.

Strategic Reports

What performance measures are represented? Other values not in annual reports such

as citizen satisfaction Investments to transform organizations These reports can more measures of

value, as PDs begin to adopt community policing models of operation

What Should PDs Report?

Issues: Authorizing environment is very complex

and dynamic, demanding different things at different times.

Police performance on varying dimensions of value can be difficult to measure

PDs aren’t usually measuring key dimensions of value beyond crime control

Table 10

Performance Dimensions Indicators

Reduce victimization Crime/victimization rates

Call offenders to account Clearance/conviction rates

Reduce fear/enhance security Levels of change in fear/self-defense

Guarantee safety in public places Traffic injuries, property values, utilization of public spaces

Financial resources Cost per citizen, deployment efficiency, budget compliance, overtime, etc

Authority resources Citizen complaints, police shootings, civil liability suits

Satisfy customer demands/achieve legitimacy

Citizen satisfaction, response times, perceived fairness

Next question: How do we get here?

Next Class

Journal 2 due Should contain 7 entries Chapters 7-9 can be a single entry