{"id":73942,"date":"2019-08-13T20:00:21","date_gmt":"2019-08-14T02:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/data-informed-policing-helps-durango-deploy-limited-resources\/"},"modified":"2019-08-14T02:00:21","modified_gmt":"2019-08-14T02:00:21","slug":"data-informed-policing-helps-durango-deploy-limited-resources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/data-informed-policing-helps-durango-deploy-limited-resources\/","title":{"rendered":"Data-informed policing helps Durango deploy limited resources"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Tessa
Tessa Reinhart, crime analyst with the Durango Police Department, tracks crime that happens in Durango. The department uses the data to help decide where to place officers and, in some cases, solve crimes.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

An uptick in serious crimes this summer may be a product of short staffing at the Durango Police Department, Chief Bob Brammer said.<\/p>\n

The number of \u201cserious crimes\u201d as defined by the FBI, increased by almost 20% from July 2018 to July 2019 in Durango, according to statistics kept by the DPD.<\/p>\n

July 2019 is the first time in the past five years the number of serious crimes reported was higher than the previous year.<\/p>\n

The Durango Police Department is hurting for employees, Brammer said. With fewer patrol officers than the department needs, the chief said local law enforcement has become more reactive than proactive.<\/p>\n

Deputy Police Chief Brice Current said when officers spend more time responding to calls rather than walking the street or talking with residents, they don\u2019t have the opportunity to get \u201cplugged in with the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt puts us in a position of mopping and not turning off the faucet,\u201d Current said.<\/p>\n

DPD, for the past year, has used data to make staffing decisions, including where and when to have officers patrolling the streets, Brammer said.<\/p>\n

The chief recognizes the threat of \u201cparalysis by analysis\u201d \u2013 and, thanks to Tessa Reinhart, DPD crime analyst, he said he has the information he needs each week to decide how best to prevent crime and keep the community safe.<\/p>\n

Reinhart said she reads as many police reports as she can each day in search of patterns \u2013 repeating criminal activity committed around a certain time of day in specific geographic locations. Police scanner traffic keeps her small, windowless office from becoming too quiet.<\/p>\n

\u201cBicycle thefts are a huge issue for us,\u201d Reinhart said. \u201cWe don\u2019t have a lot of personal crime \u2013 it\u2019s a lot more property crime; like thefts from cars.\u201d<\/p>\n

What the FBI considers \u201cPart 1 crimes\u201d \u2013 serious offenses \u2013 rose from 75 offenses in 2018 to 93 in 2019 in Durango, according to Reinhart\u2019s analysis. Those crimes include homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, motor vehicle theft and arson, according to the FBI.<\/p>\n

While crimes in specific locations are nearly impossible to predict, DPD has, over time, identified daily, weekly and monthly crime trends in the city that Chief Brammer said he\u2019s using to allocate his limited patrol resources.<\/p>\n

Law enforcement use the information garnered to \u201cdo some predictive policing\u201d \u2013 that is, putting officers in locations around the city at times when criminal activity or traffic crashes are highest. For example, there\u2019s an overlap in shifts on weekends around 2 a.m., when the bars are closing, offering increased patrols.<\/p>\n

Then, still using statistics, the department can measure its effectiveness.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf tickets and the number of crashes is down, then we\u2019re doing something right,\u201d Brammer said. \u201cBut if tickets are up and crashes are up, then we\u2019re doing something wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reinhart said she believes data-informed policing is having an impact. The number of traffic tickets fell about 40% from July 2015 to July 2019, and the number of crashes reduced by a similar margin, Brammer said. Reinhart sends weekly reports to department staff, highlighting streets or neighborhoods that have high crime or high crash rates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think just their presence is keeping criminals out,\u201d Reinhart said of patrol officers. \u201cBut sometimes it just moves to a new area.\u201d<\/p>\n

She shares information with the La Plata County Sheriff\u2019s Office and, when officers make a big arrest, they can use the information Reinhart gathers from reports to find crime trends and link suspects with unsolved cases.<\/p>\n

\u201cI give direction,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ll say, \u2018This is looking good (a hot spot for crime), you might want to check this out.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

When Reinhart has downtime, she\u2019ll read police reports in more detail or look through databases to link criminal activity in Durango to other parts of the country. She reads a lot of gruesome stuff, but she\u2019s able to leave it in the office, Reinhart said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a pleasant experience, you definitely run across people you know,\u201d said Reinhart, who is a native of La Plata County. \u201cIt\u2019s not for everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

officer presence blamed, in part, for increase in crimes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":73943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[168,1065,13,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-73942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-crime","tag-durango-police-department","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73942"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=73942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}