1. Measuring Quality of Life with GIS: Moving Beyond Part I Crimeby
Rebecca A. Colwell
University of Minnesota

2. What you are going to see today…
Why police departments assess quality of life
How these assessments are commonly
Why there is need for alternative approaches
The role of GIS
A Quality of Life Index
Case Study: Lincoln, Nebraska
determined from crime data

3. Why do Law Enforcement Agencies need to Determine Quality of Life?
FBI - Unified Crime Reports
Deployment of police resources
Grant allocation
Public awareness

4. What socio-economic factors determine Quality of Life?
Cleanliness (i.e. litter, street sweeping)
Community Participation
Crime rates
Culture and Recreation
Economy
Education
Family and Youth
Health
Housing
Infrastructure
Natural/Physical/Social Environment
Pedestrian Friendliness
Population
Resource Consumption
Responsive Government
Safety
Transportation

5. Determining Quality of Life from Law Enforcement Data…
What are Part I crimes?
How has quality of life been determined in the past?
Murder
Rape
Robbery
Aggravated Assault
Burglary
Larceny
Larceny from Auto
Arson

6. Determining Quality of Life from Law Enforcement Data…
What also affects quality of life?
Flashers
Window Peekers
Prostitution
Child Abuse
Violence
Broken-Window theory (Wilson & Kelling 1982)
“serious street crime flourishes in areas in which disorderly behavior goes unchecked”
Community-Oriented Policing
Drugs
Gangs
Residential Burglary
Abandoned/Suspicious Vehicles
Suicide
QOLI is an attempt to depict the craft knowledge street officers often know from their “on the ground” experience about the areas in greatest need of police attention.

7. Use the Power of GIS to Help Build a Safer Community!
I conducted my study with one major objective in mind: to determine the indicators available in law enforcement datasets that reflect the impact of crime on daily living
GIS helps stimulate and assist the process
Assess available data
Incident reports
Calls for service records

8. Data Joins…
Joining the calls for service records and incident report data to increase accuracy and efficiency
Case numbers serve as the basis of the join
Case numbers represent unique and unchanging information about all documented occurrences in Lincoln
If a call for service incident results in an incident report, the case number documenting the incident remains the same in both datasets.

9. Full Outer Joins…
Definition: A full outer join is a relational database technique that allows two tables, of matching and nonmatching records, to be combined into one.
Not available in popular GIS programs
Not to be confused with Left Outer Joins

10. Use the Power of GIS to Help Build a Safer Community!
Excludes crime types that seem to have little connection to neighborhood life
Shoplifting
Check offenses
Commercial burglary
Drive-offs from self-service gas pumps
Includes crime type codes for
Assault
Child abuse
Residential burglary
Vandalism
Suicide
Drug offenses
Query disregards location codes for
Medical facilities
Treatment centers
Correctional facilities
Police substations

11. A Picture Is Worth 1,000 Words
But only if you
know what those
words mean…
Northeast H.S.
Large
Supermarket
Downtown
Retail
Stores
Police Station
All Part I Crime Density
Lincoln, NE
Jail &
Detox center

12. A Picture Is Worth 1,000 Words
Jail &
Detox center
Police Station
Retail
Stores
Downtown
Northeast H.S.
Large
Supermarket
Residential
Neighborhoods
Quality of Life Index
Lincoln, NE

14. What I saw on the internet…
What is this really telling us about these cities?

15. What I saw on the internet…

16. What I saw on the internet…
Exceptional reporting and explanation of crime data
St. Paul, MN Police Department – 2002 Crime Report
City of Beaverton – Crime Maps & Statistics
“Sometimes, crime statistics can be misleading. They only represent reported crime. In some areas residents do not report crime and in others, almost all crime is reported. If you are using crime statistics to select a new place to live, don't rely on statistics alone. “

17. Legal disclaimers are not enough…
People want to believe what they see on a crime map
Explain the data – crime mapping is a tool, not an end
Use caution – exercise restraint in interpretation
Encourage dialog between administrators and street officers

18. Quality of Life Index (QOLI) Disclaimers
QOLI corrects some of the issues that arise when assessing the effects of crime/disorder on a community, but some issues remain untouched
Example: Not all Crimes are the same – larceny counts the same as murder
Another consideration would be to introduce other non-police variables into the equation
Immunization rates
Standardized reading test scores
Income
Age
Family status

19. The take home message
Move beyond Part I offenses when conducting a quality of life analyses
Part I offenses such as shoplifting, check offenses, drive-offs from self-service gas pumps, do not adequately reflect quality of life
Certain locations act as incident magnets – if left in a quality of life analysis they serve to pinpoint where hospitals, jails and treatment facilities exist within a city, rather than emphasizing the neighborhoods in critical condition
Any agency can create a department-specific QOLI based on available data
QOLI is not meant to replace the input of community officers, but rather to complement their efforts with a form of community-oriented crime analysis.