LTC 238-2024 Status of Police Dashboards and Analytics
OFFICE OF THE CITY MANAGER
LTC # LETTER TO COMMISSION
TO: Honorable Mayor Steven Meiner and Members of the City Commission
FROM: Rickelle Williams, Interim City Manager
DATE: June 10, 2024
SUBJECT: Status of Police Dashboards and Analytics
The purpose of this Letter to Commission (LTC) is to provide an update on actions taken by the Administration to fulfill requests for dashboards and reports relative to Police data, crime reports, and collaboration with the Miami-Dade County Clerk of the Courts.
Background: Since 2021, the Miami Beach Police and Information Technology (IT) Departments have collaboratively endeavored to develop and provide a catalog of reporting and dashboard
capabilities that deliver transparency and foster trust between the community and law enforcement.
For a brief period in the summer and fall of 2021, the Miami-Dade Clerk of the Courts and the Miami-Dade County Information Technology Department collaborated with the City of Miami Beach on sharing, as requested by the City, accurate and more timely case disposition data. During this
period, the County and the Administration navigated issues regarding the transmission and content of the requested datasets. The Police Department received a few datasets used to compare to internal records. The Police Department and the City's Information Technology (IT) Department began testing and comparing the datasets and ultimately concluded that there were considerable discrepancies. The City’s IT Department has met and collaborated on several occasions with the IT departments at both Miami-Dade County and the Clerk of the Courts, and while some progress has been made, there have been discrepancies which are caused by the disparate nature of the transactional systems involved in the development of the datasets required. The IT Department’s latest effort involved sending arrest data to the County and the Clerk of the Courts IT staff to see if they could “reverse-engineer” the data query to match the Police
Department’s arrests. They responded that matching the file provided would require a change in scope to the original data request made. At this point, the Police Department has a moderate level of confidence in the accuracy and timeliness of the disposition data received from the County. The
Administration does not feel it would be responsible to make policy or any other recommendations or decisions based on this data in its current form. Recommendation: The current system lacks the capability to perform a point-in-time download of all cases and establish an independent connection that does not rely on a paid subscription operating on a “credit” basis. The City has been informed that once these credits are depleted, the data stream halts, which leads to gaps in our data. This issue is exacerbated by the absence of a low credit balance alert and the inability to retrospectively fill in the data gaps once the credits are replenished. Furthermore, the City is unable to capture the arresting officer information, as the data provided is publicly accessible, and this information is protected.
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LTC 238-2024
The Administration’s recommendation would be to request that the Miami-Dade County Clerk of
the Courts, as owners of the system of record and associated data, develop a programmatic solution by which regional agencies may search disposition statuses and case status updates made by the Miami Beach Police Department, or other participating agencies. The current solution
developed from the subscription model and public record request system is being handled as a custom product through the County’s public records platform specifically for the City of Miami Beach. Any future collaboration will likely require multiple agencies and/or political bodies to act together to accomplish meaningful and precise data exchanges. As this data does not originate or belong to the City, it is not within the City’s control and cannot be validated for accuracy or comprehensiveness. Furthermore, the City has identified additional opportunities for a more robust reporting system. The existing dataset is currently unable to provide data regarding traffic citations. It is understood that this might be part of a separate system, but further discovery and design effort is needed. Ideally, the City would request to have the same level of information for traffic citations as is
provided for arrests, specifically status and disposition. These citations would either originate from Miami Beach officers, identifiable by the Agency Code (02), or be issued within our jurisdiction, identifiable by the Municipal Code (68). Lastly, the City would request to have the ability to query
recently issued warrants by original charging jurisdiction and by date. This would enable our personnel to apprehend those with outstanding warrants or identify for whom warrants were issued on any given day. We believe these enhancements will significantly improve our data accuracy
and provide valuable insights into the enforcement efforts within the City of Miami Beach. Tangentially, the City has recently launched two (2) public safety dashboards, the Monthly Crimes
Dashboard and Daily Arrest Dashboard by the four (4) patrol areas: South Beach, Mid-Beach, North Beach, and the Entertainment District. These dashboards aim to enhance the transparency of Miami Beach Police Department efforts. For more information, please contact Frank Quintana, Chief Information Officer, at FrankQuintana@miamibeachfl.gov or Ernesto Rodriguez, Executive Officer with the Miami Beach Police Department, at ErnestoRodriguez@miamibeachfl.gov. RW/FQ/WJ
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