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Background and Current Data Collection Efforts

Jurisdictions Currently Collecting Data

OREGON

SB 415 sets up the Law Enforcement Contacts Policy and Data Review Committee, which solicits data from individual agencies and provides assistance to any agency that chooses to collect data. Portland has been collecting data voluntarily, and now requires police in patrol cars and motorcycles to collect data on all stops. Eugene also has a pilot data collection program.

number jurisdictions required to collect data

S.B. 415, 71st Leg., Reg. Sess. (Or. 2001), An Act Relating to Public Safety Personnel

Status: Enacted June 29, 2001 ; Effective June 29, 2001
number jurisdictions required to collect data

Scope of Collection: vehicle stops

Restrictions: Data collection is not mandatory, but the legislation urges law enforcement agencies to establish voluntary traffic stop data collection programs

Data Collected: age, race, gender, national origin, reason for stop / alleged violation, warning given, citation given, arrest made, personal search conducted, search of vehicle conducted, other information necessary

Other Information: 2001 Senate Bill 415 establishes the Law Enforcement Contacts Policy and Data Review Committee for a six-year period to help law enforcement agencies evaluate data they collect on police stops. The purpose of the Committee is to receive and analyze demographic data to ensure that law enforcement agencies perform their missions without inequitable or unlawful discrimination based on race, color or national origin. The Committee shall submit a report by December 1, 2002 and annually thereafter.

HB 2441 was the initial introduction of legislation relating to traffic stop data collection in the last session of the legislature. Parts of HB 2441 were modified and incorporated into SB415, which was signed into law.

The relevant parts of the bill are Sections 5-10, which are repealed on December 31, 2007 based on a sunset clause in Section 11.

Related Articles:

Journal Articles and Law Reviews:

Oregon Law Enforcement Contacts Policy and Data Review Committee 2002 Annual Report

Contact Information:

Oregon Law Enforcement Contacts Policy and Data Review Committee
Meredith Bliss, Research Analyst
635 Capitol Street NE, Suite 350
Salem, OR 97301-2524
503-986-6489
fax: 503-986-4574
meredith.bliss@state.or.us
http://www.ocjc.state.or.us/Racial_Profiling/LECPDRC.HTM

number jurisdictions required to collect data

H.B. 2433, 69th Leg., Reg. Session (Or. 1997), An Act Relating to Criminal Procedure

Status: Enacted August 15, 1997 ; Effective October 04, 1997
number jurisdictions required to collect data

Restrictions: Required jurisdictions to establish policies, allowed for limited data collection, including a public perception survey

Other Information: Required law enforcement agencies to collect data and adopt policies "prohibiting the stopping, detention and search of persons when the action is motivated by the officer's perception of the person's race, color, sex or national origin and when the action would constitute a violation of the person's civil rights" by January 31, 1998. Also required agencies to facilitate the filing of complaints about police practices. Part of the data collection effort was the public perception survey, "Public Perceptions of Stop Decisions by Oregon State Police Officers," completed by Campbell DeLong Resources, Inc. in 1999. Another part was the compilation of summaries of complaint data that agencies received. After the initial reporting period, that effort was continued on a voluntary basis for two years, but then discontinued in favor of the traffic stop data collection effort under SB 415.

The relevant section of the bill is Section 6.

Related Articles:

Journal Articles and Law Reviews:

Public Perceptions of Stop Decisions by Oregon State Police Officers
Campbell DeLong Resources, Inc.

Contact Information:

Other Collection Efforts

Corvallis

Basis for collection: voluntary

Data Collected: age, race, gender, date, time, location, duration of stop, action taken, search of vehicle conducted

Additional Information: The City of Corvallis Police Department has participated in a voluntary stop data collection effort in cooperation with the State of Oregon Law Enforcement Contacts Policy and Data Review Committee since April 2001. In November 2002, a subcommittee of the Corvallis Police Department’s Community Policing Forum was formed to review and attempt to analyze stop data collected by the Police Department. A report on the data analysis was released by the department in July 2003.

Related Articles:

Eugene

Basis for collection: voluntary

Effective: August, 2001

Restrictions: pilot program

Data Collected: age, gender, other

Additional Information: A pilot program was started in late August 2001 with only 30 officers collecting 16 pieces of information including age and gender.

Related Articles:

Contact Information:
Eugene Police Department
777 Pearl St., Room 105
Eugene, OR 97401
http://www.ci.eugene.or.us/police/index.htm

Portland

Basis for collection: voluntary

Effective: January, 2001

Scope of collection: all stops

Additional Information: Data collection on all vehicle and pedestrian stops. Motorcycle police officers began collecting data 6 months after data collection began. The first 6 months of collection have been criticized, as it is unknown if cruisers and motorcycles are dispatched proportionally in different ethnic neighborhoods.

Related Articles:

Portland, OR: Police data on stops unused, incomplete

Contact Information:
Portland Police Bureau, Planning and Support Unit
Steve Beedle
1111 S.W. 2nd Ave.
Portland, OR 97204
503-823-0298
SBeedle@police.ci.portland.or.us

Portland Police Bureau, Planning and Support
Jane Braaten
1111 S.W. 2nd Ave.
Portland, OR 97204
503-823-0283
JBraaten@police.ci.portland.or.us

ANALYSIS OF RACIAL DISPARITIES IN THE NEW YORK CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT'S STOP, QUESTION, AND FRISK PRACTICES

RAND Corporation

In 2006, the New York City Police Department (NYPD) stopped a half-million pedestrians for suspected criminal involvement. Raw statistics for these encounters suggest large racial disparities — 89 percent of the stops involved nonwhites. Do these statistics point to racial bias in police officers’ decisions to stop particular pedestrians? Do they indicate that officers are particularly intrusive when stopping nonwhites? The NYPD asked the RAND Center on Quality Policing (CQP) to help it understand this issue and identify recommendations for addressing potential problems. CQP researchers analyzed data on all street encounters between NYPD officers and pedestrians in 2006. They compared the racial distribution of stops to external benchmarks, attempts to construct what the racial distribution of the stopped pedestrians would have been if officers’ stop decisions had been racially unbiased. Then they compared each officer’s stopping patterns with an internal benchmark constructed from stops in similar circumstances made by other officers. Finally, they examined stop outcomes, assessing whether stopped white and nonwhite suspects have different rates of frisk, search, use of force, and arrest. They found small racial differences in these rates and make communication, recordkeeping, and training recommendations to the NYPD for improving police-pedestrian interactions.

FLORIDA: JACKSONVILLE POLICE RECEIVE NO RACIAL PROFILING COMPLAINTS IN ’08

The Jacksonville Police Department presented its annual Racial Profiling Report which covers Calendar Year 2008 and showed that JPD received no formal reports of racial profiling. It also confirmed that local police are conducting traffic stops using legal criteria and not race as their motivation for enforcement action. Currently, the Texas Racial Profiling Law requires that police departments collect data pertaining to traffic stops, pedestrian stops, searches conducted and citations issued.

TEXAS: BELLAIRE MAYOR TO INVESTIGATE RACIAL PROFILING ALLEGATIONS

The mayor of Bellaire responded publicly for the first time to allegations of racial profiling due to an incident of mistaken identity. Officers will now be required to participate in additional cultural sensitivity training. The city is also hiring an independent state consultant to analyze traffic stop data for 2008 and look for incidents of racial profiling. The mayor also promised to release the results of the district attorney's investigation publicly, once it is completed.

CALIFORNIA: TORRANCE POLICE PROFILING SUIT IS DEFEATED

A woman who claimed she was wrongly arrested by Torrance police because of her race has lost her federal lawsuit against the city, a former chief and two officers. Sara Plowden, who lived in Gardena when she filed the civil rights lawsuit in January 2006, claimed she was subjected to a "driving while black" arrest early on Nov. 23, 2003. She claimed the officers physically accosted her and that city officials and former Police Chief James Herren allowed "an atmosphere of lawlessness, abuse and misconduct" to fester in the department.

ARKANSAS: ARIZONA DPS TIGHTENS SEARCH RULES TO AVOID PROFILING

The Arizona Department of Public Safety, in moves intended to prevent and detect racial profiling, is making internal changes that include requiring Highway Patrol officers to document why they search vehicles they stop. Other changes announced by Gov. Janet Napolitano's office include requiring officers to obtain a motorist's consent for a search to get the driver's signature or to use video or audio to record the driver giving permission verbally.

UTAH: UTAH HIGHWAY PATROL OFFICER ACCUSED OF RACIAL PROFILING

Sherida Felders, a black grandmother, alleges a Utah Highway Patrol officer had no reason to believe her Jeep Commander contained illegal substances, but called in a drug-sniffing dog after stopping her for speeding Felders has filed a suit accusing the trooper of conducting an illegal search of her vehicle for drugs based on racial profiling.