The Dalai Lama said, “a lack of transparency results in distrust and a deep sense of insecurity.”
If that’s true, and we believe it is, Bloomington has just become more trustworthy and more secure.
Easy access to Bloomington Police Department data has been made accessible through the city’s participation in the White House Police Data Initiative. Simply, Bloomington police operations have become more transparent.
The initiative came out of President Barack Obama’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing. One task force recommendation encouraged police departments to share data with the public to build community trust through transparency.
The Bloomington Police Department officials were eager to take part because they believe the department does many things right when it comes to community policing. The announcement this week that 10 areas of data are available for all to see shows the eagerness in practice. The information is from the first quarter of 2016, and subsequent quarterly reports will follow.
Included is information on officer-involved shootings; use of force by police; reports of hate or bias-based offenses and crimes; citizen complaints against an officer and the disciplinary measures taken; nuisance complaints reported to police; traffic citations; calls to the police for service; employee demographics; officer training; and requests made to the police for things like speaking at schools or neighborhood meetings.
Each area of information helps describe and explain the work of the police department and how it interacts with the greater community. It should help show the department as a part of the community, not an organization to be set apart from it. That’s a good thing.
The information is worth examining. It can be found at https://data.bloomington.in.gov/group/public-safety.