Tuesday, July 06, 2010
The state of crime
At this end of this post, there are some hard questions related to the number of Lakewood police officers on the streets. It takes some background and even some statistics to get to the questions, so I ask for your patience.
My loyal readers, both of you, know I used to be editor of the Lakewood Journal, back when Lakewood had a community print paper. We are blessed with some fine substitutes, a strong regional paper and a local blog, but local weekly papers did have their uses. One things community papers still do in the towns where they survive is report on weekly or monthly crime statistics.
The challenge in Lakewood today is that the community as a whole really doesn't have to think about crime unless they're a victim or have some other special interest. This troubles me. There was a lot of value in analyzing the numbers, because sometimes tactics had to be adjusted to prevent or fight crime.
One reason I'd really love to see more focus right now is because of some trends I've noticed in the monthly crime reports given the Lakewood City Council. The last month I looked at was April because I was able to get Tacoma's numbers for comparison. (=thanks to a kind member of the Tacoma City Council)
Violent Crime
Lakewood Down 12 percent year to date January-April 2009 to 2010
Tacoma Down 18 percent year to date (Statistically, these are pretty similar numbers)
Property Crime
Lakewood Down 10 percent
Tacoma Down 3 percent (again, like the comparison above, within 7 percentage points of each other)
Prostitution
Lakewood down 33 percent
Tacoma down 3 percent (now that's a difference)
Total Drug Crimes
Two Tacoma Categories of Drug Crimes They Report to Council: Up 74% and 14%
Three Lakewood Categories They report to Council: Down 14%, 68% and 24%
Forgery and Fraud
I don't have Tacoma numbers for these categories, but in Lakewood, the categories are up this much year to date from 2009: 25 percent, 56 percent, 75 percent and 160 percent.
So ... here are my questions:
Have incidences of prostitution and drug crimes decreased in Lakewood, or is our budget allowing us to put enough officers on the street to catch more offenders?
Is forgery a bigger problem regionally or nationwide, or is our Lakewood budget allowing us to put enough officers on the street to prevent it and/or catch offenders?
Last night the council approved budget changes that included $175,000 worth of salary savings in the police department. Sales tax revenues are down, and one way the city dealt with that was to leave some patrol positions vacant. When I asked about it, the city said that salary savings within the police department was pretty much usual procedure. Then I look at the numbers above, with incidences of us catching drug criminals and prostitutes down, and reports of forgery and fraud skyrocketing.
I wish there was a way for the community to ask why. I miss my newspaper.
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My loyal readers, both of you, know I used to be editor of the Lakewood Journal, back when Lakewood had a community print paper. We are blessed with some fine substitutes, a strong regional paper and a local blog, but local weekly papers did have their uses. One things community papers still do in the towns where they survive is report on weekly or monthly crime statistics.
The challenge in Lakewood today is that the community as a whole really doesn't have to think about crime unless they're a victim or have some other special interest. This troubles me. There was a lot of value in analyzing the numbers, because sometimes tactics had to be adjusted to prevent or fight crime.
One reason I'd really love to see more focus right now is because of some trends I've noticed in the monthly crime reports given the Lakewood City Council. The last month I looked at was April because I was able to get Tacoma's numbers for comparison. (=thanks to a kind member of the Tacoma City Council)
Violent Crime
Lakewood Down 12 percent year to date January-April 2009 to 2010
Tacoma Down 18 percent year to date (Statistically, these are pretty similar numbers)
Property Crime
Lakewood Down 10 percent
Tacoma Down 3 percent (again, like the comparison above, within 7 percentage points of each other)
Prostitution
Lakewood down 33 percent
Tacoma down 3 percent (now that's a difference)
Total Drug Crimes
Two Tacoma Categories of Drug Crimes They Report to Council: Up 74% and 14%
Three Lakewood Categories They report to Council: Down 14%, 68% and 24%
Forgery and Fraud
I don't have Tacoma numbers for these categories, but in Lakewood, the categories are up this much year to date from 2009: 25 percent, 56 percent, 75 percent and 160 percent.
So ... here are my questions:
Have incidences of prostitution and drug crimes decreased in Lakewood, or is our budget allowing us to put enough officers on the street to catch more offenders?
Is forgery a bigger problem regionally or nationwide, or is our Lakewood budget allowing us to put enough officers on the street to prevent it and/or catch offenders?
Last night the council approved budget changes that included $175,000 worth of salary savings in the police department. Sales tax revenues are down, and one way the city dealt with that was to leave some patrol positions vacant. When I asked about it, the city said that salary savings within the police department was pretty much usual procedure. Then I look at the numbers above, with incidences of us catching drug criminals and prostitutes down, and reports of forgery and fraud skyrocketing.
I wish there was a way for the community to ask why. I miss my newspaper.
Comments:
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What information exists between crime that occurs at the casinos and actual reports by the Lakewood Police Department? In particular, given the "skyrocketing" forgery and fraud reports, do these officer narratives include any reference to reasons/motives as to why these crimes occured? Or are those questions even asked?
Percentage declines (or increases) are meaningless numbers when comparing Lakewood and Tacoma or any other cities. We don't know the base numbers from which the decline or increases are calculated. For instance a 33% decline in prostitution arrests means nothing compared to a 3% decline if the latter decline is based upon a very low number of prostitution arrests. Indeed a city with absolutely no prostitution would show a 0% decline: hardly a valid crime comparison to a city with rampant prostitution and a 33% decline. More meaningful would be the crime rate per population (typically number of crimes per 100,000 population): then you would a least be comparing apples to apples.
John Arbeeny
John Arbeeny
David, I'll ask your question. John, I wouldn't call the numbers meaningless in that they are the source for asking questions, but I absolutely agree the numbers don't carry meaning in and among themselves. Some of the forgery report numbers are very small, thus allowing for large swings in percentages. And it only takes one concentrated focus on enforcement to change prostitution numbers quite a lot.
Your point about crime rate is a good one. I note that the Tacoma report to its council includes crime rate numbers, and Lakewood's does not; I'm gathering feedback and will pass that along.
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Your point about crime rate is a good one. I note that the Tacoma report to its council includes crime rate numbers, and Lakewood's does not; I'm gathering feedback and will pass that along.
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