DDACTS Evaluability Assessment: Final Report on Individual and Cross-Site Findings

• NCJ Number: 247889
• Author(s): David McClure; Jeremy Levy; Nancy La Vigne; David Hayeslip
• Date Published: June 2014
• Length: 167 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2012-IJ-CX-0037
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation
• Award: Proposal for an Evaluability Assessment of Law Enforcement Agencies Using the Data-Driven Approaches to Crime and Traffic Safety

Annotation

This report presents the findings and methodology of an assessment of the evaluability of sites participating in the Data-Driven Approaches to Crime and Traffic Safety (DDACTS) initiative, based on an analysis of 15 sites out of 441 law enforcement agencies that have received DDACTS training and/or technical assistance.

Abstract

Rather than being a prescribed program with defined program elements, DDACTS is based on a set of seven general principles for developing a data-driven approach to law enforcement decisionmaking. The principles are listed as partners and stakeholder participation; data collection; data analysis; strategic operations; information sharing and outreach; monitoring, evaluation, and adjustment; and outcomes. It is anticipated that the application of these principles will enable law enforcement agencies to make more efficient use of resources by directing high-visibility patrols to the recurring times and places that have overlapping crime and traffic safety issues. DDACTS has been enthusiastically pursued at the visited sites, and this apparently has led to significant changes in agency operations that are viewed by the law enforcement agencies as beneficial. Many of the agencies have provided analyses that show reduction in crime and/or traffic incidents that have co-occurred with the implementation of DDACTS. These findings provide a strong argument for conducting a rigorous, objective evaluation that will determine the data-based promise of the DDACTS model and whether it merits continued expansion. Working with stakeholders, evaluators identified and conducted site visits with 15 jurisdictions from across the country. These visits documented the variation in characteristics of each of the 15 sites and collected information needed to determine evaluability. These data informed a set of recommendations about which sites should be considered for inclusion in a future evaluation, which should not, and which could be included pending development of certain conditions within their sites. Extensive figures