THE COMPSTAT PROCESS—Managing Crime Reduction on the LAPD
November 6, 2008
Introduction
As the Officer in Charge of the Los Angeles Police Department’s (LAPD) Compstat Unit, I have had the opportunity to travel to many law enforcement agencies in the United States and around the world to teach and assist their agency representatives in the principles, practices, policies and procedures of implementing and sustaining a viable and successful Compstat process on their departments. The immediate questions that I am asked are, “Where do we buy the Compstat computer software application?” and, “Where is the Compstat computer that will allow us to have the success in crime reduction that the LAPD has achieved for the last six years?” I then realized that most police departments have a specific misunderstanding about the Compstat process and its application to crime fighting efforts. The reality is that the Compstat process is not a single state-of-the-art computer equipped with a special software program. In general terms, the Compstat process is a management accountability, problem solving methodology and crime control philosophy. It is less state-of-the-art equipment then a state of mind attitude that police do count in reducing crime. Compstat is not a “quick-fix” answer to crime but a process of organized problem solving, and when coupled with commitment, consistency and accountability, inexorably leads to the positive outcome of recurring incremental reductions in crime.
The following is an explanation of the Compstat process in the LAPD experience and how it can be applied to any large or small agency and even to any civilian organization. I will give you one caveat, as a chief executive or command or staff officer of any police or sheriff’s department or other law enforcement agency, you and your employees must be willing to enter a new paradigm and search for best practices in crime reduction based on the information you learn about Compstat. The good news is that the Compstat process is for many agencies a combination of existing capabilities realigned to coincide with basic Compstat principles.
Detective III Jeff Godown, Officer in Charge, Compstat Unit
Background
It is the vision of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) to, as closely as possible, achieve a city free from crime and public disorder. Its mission is to safeguard the lives and property of the people it serves, to reduce the incidence and fear of crime and to enhance public safety, while working with diverse communities to improve their quality of life. The LAPD mandate is to do so with honor and integrity, acting at all times with the highest ethical standards to maintain public confidence.
Leading, managing and directing a law enforcement agency toward its stated mission is a demanding responsibility for an organization’s chief executive, regardless of the size of the department. “The fact is that police do matter when it comes to preventing crime.”
The Compstat Process—Managing Crime Reduction on the LAPD
November 6, 2008
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This statement has been uttered on many occasions by the pioneer of the Compstat process, former New York Police Department (NYPD) Commissioner and current Chief of Police of the LAPD, William J. Bratton. Building on the successes of the Compstat revolution on the NYPD in reducing crime in the City of New York beginning in 1994, LAPD’s new Chief of Police introduced the Compstat process in Los Angeles in 2002, his inaugural year on the Department.
Compstat Process—What is it?
Compstat, short for “computer comparison statistics,” is a multi-faceted system for managing police operations. It is an innovative business management process, system and strategic methodology used to assist in achieving an organization’s mission and goals. Its methods are transferable, compatible and replicable in any organization or environment. In a police organization, it is a crime-control process manifested in recurring Compstat meetings, usually one per week, during which the entity’s performance indicators are critically reviewed for improvement. The Compstat concept has been used widely in the law enforcement arena in many different forms across the United States and around the world. It is an organizational management philosophy, concept and tool combining a classic problem-solving model with accountability at all levels of the organization. It is an examination and review of an organization’s status as revealed by quantifiable statistical indicators. In a police environment, the number and location of crimes and arrests as well as an analysis of suspects, victims, days and times of criminal activity, etc. occurs in order to identify crime patterns, clusters, suspects and hot spots. Once identified, strategies are created to counter the increasing incidence of crime. The Compstat process encourages creativity in strategy creation, allocation of resources and deployment of police personnel, while at the same time holding managers and employees accountable for proactively confronting the problems of crime.
The Compstat process is a two-pronged examination of police operations. It looks outwardly at crime and its effects in the community, while at the same time looking within the organization to identify best practices in managing police personnel and risk management issues such as sick time, use of force, pursuits, complaints and accompanying city liability. The examination of crime and internal police department processes allows for the reengineering of those processes in response to crime, which can produce significant public safety gains, not only in crime reduction, but also in increased effectiveness in various other essential police performance measures.
The Compstat process can be summarized in the following statement: “Collect, analyze, map and review crime data and other police performance measures on a regular basis, create best practice strategies to address identified issues and implement them in real time, hold police managers and employees accountable for their performance as measured by these data and, consistently review and repeat the process.”
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This instills a new organizational culture that keeps personnel focused on the mission of the organization and creates a management mandate to continuously adapt to the ever changing crime environment.
Compstat Process—How does it work?
One of the most important roles of the Chief of Police is to set organizational goals and objectives, which sends a powerful message throughout a police department as to the importance and direction of employees’ efforts. Once the Compstat process is communicated to the organization as a foundational objective to be achieved, its principles can be used to support, enhance and streamline the processes and procedures which define the multitude of functions inherent in competently performing patrol and detective operations in an organized approach to crime reduction. As a problem solving model, the Compstat process directs employees to identify problems, formulate solutions, carry them out, and analyze results for effectiveness. The Compstat process business management model in policing was created around this concept and consists of four principles, which define the strategy for driving down crime, hand in hand with creating internal procedural economies and efficiencies. It is equally applicable to addressing community crime problems, quality of life issues as well as internal risk management incidents and policies. Four Compstat Principles form the outline for carrying out the myriad of activities involved in practicing effective Compstat process operations. The application of these principles are reviewed, examined and discussed relative to specific police department commands during weekly recurring Compstat information sharing forum meetings and inspections led by the Chief of Police or other assigned high ranking command or staff officers.
The four Compstat Principles are:
1. Accurate and Timely Intelligence……....Know what’s happening.
2. Effective Tactics………………………...Have a plan.
3. Rapid Deployment……………………....Do it quickly.
4. Relentless Follow-up and Assessment….If it works, do more. If not, do something else.
Accurate and Timely Intelligence
The Compstat process encompasses best practices from various past and present policing methodologies. It includes successful leadership ideas and concepts as well as practices from “Community Policing”, “Problem Oriented Policing” and the “Broken Windows” philosophies. It is inclusive of the definitions of reviewing, inspecting, auditing, analyzing and information sharing.
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At the core of each activity is the use of computer generated and other statistical data that is gathered in as close to real time as possible and subsequently presented in various formats in hard copy and electronically at the Compstat meetings; such as charts, graphs, maps, command profiles, and crime snapshot reports. The analysis of the information by command and staff officers then becomes the triggering mechanism for taking action on identified problems.
The Compstat process is information and data driven, and as such, it is necessary for all information to be as timely and accurate as possible. Without accurate and timely sources of data, management decisions could be rendered ineffectual. The credibility of the process would be in question by management, the employees expected to act on the data, as well as other stakeholders who routinely use the information. The basic information necessary to make informed decisions relative to the creation of crime reduction strategies and action plans comes from many sources. At the basic level, information is gathered from a department’s statistical archives on crimes and arrests required to be reported to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting program, i.e. Criminal Homicide, Forcible Rape, Robbery, Aggravated Assault, Burglary, Larceny-Theft, Motor Vehicle Theft and Arson. In addition, “intelligence” data is obtained from archived calls for service, field interview cards, incident reports and any other sources of information, which are normally maintained by police departments’ information technology sections. In addition to the crime and arrest statistics side of the crime reduction equation, is the analysis of risk management issues related to a police department’s internal administrative and personnel operations. In this area, trends can also be identified with negative issues quickly addressed and resolved, which ensures that personnel resources are available to implement crime reduction strategies and action plans.
Well running internal police department mechanisms support the external efforts to address crime and its effects. Risk managers must use critical thinking, issues analysis and problem solving to ensure internal department operations are not creating procedural impediments to successful crime reduction efforts. One of the basic problems in the early stages of the implementation of a new Compstat process in a law enforcement agency is that the department may be unable to produce appropriate data via its existing computer technology systems. Without the ability to extract this type of information, the Compstat process cannot address “emerging” crime and risk management issues in a timely manner, which is critical to a successful process. Information systems will need to be audited, monitored and tested for both accuracy and timeliness and existing capabilities may need to be enhanced to accomplish these types of tasks. The information used absolutely needs to reflectwhat actually occurred and accuracy can be authenticated through audits and supervisory review. This technological audit process will ensure that decisions are made using accurate and timely data, which is the life-blood of the decision-making process.
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The initial target of review will be the crime or incident report, which is the primary documentation vehicle and information platform for the majority of police statistics. These reports have to be accurately completed in a timely manner by first responders and then the information has to be transferred into the department’s Report Management System by data entry personnel before it can be used in the Compstat process. The involved records employees are critical to producing timely and accurate information for use by subsequent crime analysts reviewing the data. If attention is not paid to this process, the proverbial “garbage in, garbage out” dilemma will occur and taint the analysis and decision making processes. In addition to examining core law enforcement statistics, any pertinent data sub-sets can be reviewed such as parole and probation issues, gun arrests, sex offender residences, etc. for analysis and/or inclusion in single purpose or relational geographic information system automated “pin” mapping.
Effective Tactics
In the words of Jack Maple, former NYPD Deputy Commissioner, “Nobody ever got in trouble because crime numbers on their watch went up………trouble arose only if the commanders didn’t know why the numbers went up or had no plan to attack the problem.” After command and staff officers are in possession of timely and accurate intelligence, they are accountable for the creation, development and implementation of crime reduction strategies and action plans for the purpose of impacting the identified crime or risk management problems. Their understanding of recurring problems and strategies that have been successful in the past will be communicated and delegated to specific subordinate command personnel who may add their creative ideas to the strategy and “think outside the box” to be sure the problems are addressed in an optimal fashion. It is not simply good enough to randomly throw additional resources at the problem such as more patrol cars, without a clear and concise plan, or conclude that not enough resources are available to impact the problem. Under staffing and insufficient resourcing may be an impediment to a specific operational plan but it does not preclude the problem solver from making an effort to identify other perhaps less conventional resources. Partnerships with the community and other government agencies should be explored for creative solutions to recurring problems and lack of regular police resources should not be cited during a Compstat meeting to justify or explain non-action on an identified issue, problem or crime increase.
For tactics to be effective, commanders must direct specific resources to target all aspects of the problem using their existing police resources as well as resources from the array of available community, city, county, state and federal government capabilities. The following are some of the entities to partnership with, or derive resources from, in order to address crime reduction and community quality of life issues. For decades, police departments have been driven by calls for service and responded with limited resources in a reactive manner.
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With the Compstat process, police departments can be armed with vital information regarding emerging crime trends or patterns that allow for the creation of effective tactics and a proactive strategic police response, during stand-alone efforts or in partnership with other community or government stakeholders.
City & LocalCountyStateFederal
Housing AuthoritySheriff’s Dept.CorrectionsFederal Bureau of Invest.
Parks & RecreationDistrict AttorneyParoleDrug Enforcement Admin.
Fire DepartmentMental HealthDMVAlcohol, Tobacco & FirearmsSchool Police Homeless Outreach CHP Internal Revenue Service
Sanitation Dept. Superior CourtPOSTImmigration & Naturalization
Neighborhood WatchChildren’s ServicesABCHomeland Security Admin.
Animal ServicesHarbor Dept.Gambling Veterans Administration Domestic Violence Probation Amber Alert Department of Aging
There are numerous, varied and unique crime reduction and problem-solving strategies that are only limited by the creativity, experience and institutional knowledge of managers and police employees who should look at their crime problems from new and different views, and perspectives than has been done in the past. One of the strengths of the Compstat process is that it provides a vehicle of recurring meetings for consistent strategizing via creative discussions, the tweaking of operational plans and the reviewing of implemented strategies at various stages of a tactical plan. Included in these discussions are debriefing style after-action biopsies of the results of specific plans. In addition, Compstat builds accountability into tactical strategies. Command officers assigned for a Compstat review know in advance that their crime reduction/problem-solving activities and tactics will be reviewed in light of conventional wisdom and knowledge as well as on any results realized from their plans. They will be asked, “Did your efforts result in any effects upon the identified problem?” In this way, not only will the command officers be accountable, but each individual along the way of the plan from detectives, lieutenants and officers involved in the process may be questioned about the process during the Compstat meeting inspection. In addition, the collective knowledge of various employee ranks will be brought to bear on the creation of effective tactics.