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Managing Crime and Quality of Life Using Compstat: Specific Issues in Implementation and Practice (From Resource Material Series No. 68, P 117-132, 2006, Simon Cornell, ed. -- See NCJ-216921)

NCJ Number
216929
Author(s)
Dr. Vincent E. Henry
Date Published
2006
Length
16 pages
Annotation
This paper discusses issues that may arise in the implementation and operation of a Compstat-based police management model, focusing on the practical and implementation issues encountered in the early stages of Compstat's development in the New York City Police Department (NYPD).
Abstract
Compstat emphasizes the collection and analysis of crime data, followed by strategic planning and implementation. Key agency personnel meet regularly to plan crime-control strategies based on crime-data analysis and to monitor progress in existing projects. Overall, the NYPD has had few difficulties in implementing Compstat; however, police managers' anxiety about an unfamiliar system and the accountability it emphasized was an issue. This reaction tended to be prevalent among supervisors, managers, and executives who feared being held accountable for their performance. Some proved to be unsuited to a commanding-officer position. Compstat revealed their inadequacies, and they were reassigned to units commensurate with their abilities. A related problem during the early phases of Compstat implementation was a resistance to change in the previous management mindset. Compstat requires rapid action to identify and respond to crime incidents and patterns. Many of the NYPD managers had been accustomed to an untested, sluggish, bureaucratic process of decisionmaking. Compstat jolted them into a new system for the efficient collection, analysis, and rapid planning and response to identified crime problems in the city, followed by an analysis of performance. This paper concludes with a discussion of how Compstat's rapid analysis and response to incidents is suited to terrorism threats and attacks. 10 references