The CotoBuzz Journal, Community Journalism

May 2008 ISSUE

We do not make jokes, we simply watch the LA Times, the Orange County Register and CID/HOA board of directors and report the facts!

OCSD Public Safety Statistics: Follow Up to Letter to Pat Bates

May 1, 2008

Earlier this week we took our concerns to Orange County Supervisor Pat Bates anent availability of community-specific crime and vandalism data from the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. Concerned that we may be way off base, we sent a copy of the letter to all the candidates for the Orange County Sheriff, as well as a clarifying note to the OCSD, paraphrased below:

Please review our logic and see where we may be wrong - Our premise perhaps simplistic follows:

It is widely known that you cannot manage what you cannot measure.

Given that public safety should be a high priority for the OCBS and the OCSD, seems logical that it would be in the best interest of these two governing bodies to provide local leaders with relevant public safety trending data, hence involving the community in public safety efforts. Further, the format we have worked out, should be invaluable to public-safety focused communities in Orange County

If that premise has any merit, it would then be incumbent upon the OCSD technology and management teams, to make sure the tools are available to retrieve the information as needed – no different than a business intelligence tool for example – so when the OCSD argues that there is a periodic programming effort required to produce a simple report, the implications are that the tools being used are either archaic or the personnel is not competent. Then even when media (the CotoBuzz Journal) agrees to pay for such programming, those responsible for the programming are for the most part unreliable.

If the argument above is somewhat reasonable, why is it that both bodies - the OCBS and OCSD seem to either not care, or perhaps seem to relegate the issue to the bottom of the priority list? Ironic that when we are providing an invaluable public service, there are so many artificial obstacles. Take for instance Lt. Bill Griffin – several emails have been sent to him in the past – he has never responded

We should be clear that Jim Amormino has been consistently responsive. Leads us to believe that the current OCSD is more interested in PR than in public safety.

We are pleased to report that earlier today, we spoke with an OCSD representative who agreed with us on the value of the public safety management tools we have developed, and agreed to faithfully support our efforts going forward. Turns out that candidates for Sheriff are also in agreement as evidenced by the following comments:

“ That is pretty silly for the media/taxpayers to pay for information our tax dollars and fees already should provide access to” Kevin Keyes, OCSD Sheriff Candidate

“I am intimately familiar with statistical crime reporting. I can assure
you that if I am appointed to the Sheriff's position in June, you will receive credible/reliable crime statistics at no charge” Ralph Martin, Commander, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, OCSD Sheriff Candidate

The one person we have not heard from is Supervisor Pate Bates – not that we expected her to respond.

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