Small town policing and data transparency
We are a nation of small towns
Policing in large cities gets a lot of attention, and deservedly so. Breonna Taylor? Louisville. George Floyd and Philando Castile? Twin Cities. Eric Garner? New York. Laquan McDonald? Chicago. Tamir Rice? Cleveland. Freddie Gray? Baltimore.
At the other end of the spectrum, I live in a town of 8,000 people… and merely 6,000 if you exclude the rotating population of 2,000 Williams College students who each reside here for four years. We have one stoplight. We also have a police department that had a photo of Hitler posted inside for 20 years.
I’m on a mission to make America pay more attention to policing outside of big cities. If you are wondering why you should care, one answer lies in the numbers. The proportion of Americans who live in municipalities of over 50,000 is merely 39%, meaning that 61% of us do not. But policing in these locales often is overlooked.
Unlike their large urban counterparts, small municipality police departments tend to have fewer resources, less access to advanced training, and less public scrutiny. Meanwhile, small-municipality America is not a monolith. It is racially, ethnically, and socio-economically diverse, composed of numerous Indigenous communities, significant African American populations, and increasing numbers of Latinx residents. And finally, racial profiling, use of force, and over-incarceration are not exclusive to urban areas. For example, an analysis by the Vera Institute of Justice shows that incarceration rates in rural counties and small metro areas are substantially higher than those in urban and suburban counties. Putting these points all together: small municipalities are places where social justice and civil rights issues impact minoritized populations within a setting where transparency is absent.
Transparency is critical for ensuring our rights. It exposes the practices of police departments to public scrutiny, allows for informed debate about police practices and strategies, and fosters a culture of accountability. Chicago has a public-facing police data portal with at least some useful information. So does Los Angeles. You know where there is not a public-facing data portal? Williamstown, Massachusetts. Nor Hampton, Florida. Nor Columbus, New Mexico. And literally thousands of other towns. Let’s fix this.
In future posts, I’m going to reveal more of the story of what happened in my town, including how we — the residents — have created our own public-facing data tools to better understand how we’re being policed. Transparency can bolster the rights and safety of people being policed right now. Moreover, if we, as a society, are moving towards police abolition, transparency will help us on that journey.
Your neighbor,
Chad
