The Durham Police Department recently unveiled a new Internet tool that allows current and prospective residents easy access to area crime statistics.
The "crime mapper," which can be accessed from DPD's website, taps into city and county crime databases and maps specific types of crime by location. Officials stressed that the crime mapper is still a work in progress but noted positive feedback from those who have tested out the system.
Linda Moiseenko, program coordinator for Duke Community Housing, added a link to the crime mapper from the community housing website, noting that graduate and undergraduate students looking to live off campus can use the system before deciding where to live.
"Students come into my office wanting to live in a safe area, but 'safe' is really something they need to determine for themselves," Moiseenko said. "Part of living in a safe area is knowing about area crime, and now that the information is on the Internet it's easier for them to find what they're looking for."
Before the crime mapper went online, residents could obtain crime information from local newspapers or by calling DPD and requesting a report, but Moiseenko said these methods produced inaccurate or slow results, respectively.
Reyn Bowman, president of the Durham Convention and Visitors Bureau, said that crime information passed along through the media or by word of mouth was not very useful. "With anecdotal reports, you don't know if it's the same crime talked about 10 times, or 10 different crimes," he said. "Plus, you don't know the locations of the crimes, so it creates a generalized sense of unsafety."
Bowman said the crime mapper resolves these issues, allowing residents to get straight facts that pertain to their own neighborhoods.
"Now people can get data for their areas rather than in big districts," he said. "They won't feel generally unsafe so the police department will be able to better organize its staff where there are problems."
Moiseenko added that the time lag involved with getting a police report was sometimes problematic for students who had only a short time frame in which they must secure housing.
"A lot of incoming graduate or professional students visiting have maybe three days at most that they'll be in Durham," she said. "They would rather not wait around to get the information they're looking for from the Durham police."
Now with the crime mapper in place, users can search for crimes by time frame, type of crime and location. The system immediately draws a map of the location with dots representing where each type of crime occurred and also charts the frequency of each specified crime.
"We had heard from various community groups that this type of service was a real need," said Maj. Charles Tiffin, DPD chief of investigative services. "We think it will be a really useful tool for citizens to understand what the crime situation is or isn't in a particular area, or even all over the city or county."
Tiffin said the crime mapper data goes back to 2002 and will be updated regularly from now on. He added that the system, which will be tweaked as DPD receives more feedback from users, could serve as a model for the rest of the state.
"I presented the system at the [Partners Against Crime, District Two] meeting Monday night and came out with an entire page of suggestions that citizens thought could make it even more useful," Tiffin said.
He added that the system will eventually break down crime by neighborhood so that users can search an area without having to know a specific address.
Bowman said the crime mapper could cause some initial anxiety amongst Durham residents, as they will now be able to maintain awareness of all the different crimes transpiring nearby.
"Now all this information is in front of you, whereas before you could only see a little at a time so you didn't see how much existed," Bowman said. "But people quickly adapt, and we'll eventually be able to use this information to our benefit."
Newman Aguiar, former chair of the PAC2 crime information task force, said having information immediately available for residents can help prevent smaller crimes by augmenting programs such as the upcoming Citizens on Patrol program, which can use the crime maps to determine which areas are in greatest need of patrols.
Bowman added that major crimes can also be diminished by preventing minor crimes.
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