[bouldercouncilhotline] Hotline: Hillard heintze report. Questions for tonight

[cmosupport at bouldercolorado.gov]

Sender: Morzel, Lisa

Tonight council will be discussing the Hillard Heintze report. I received an email from someone with the following comments, suggestions and questions :

 I'd just like to bring to your attention that the recommendation about data collection and analysis ought to include something about HOW the data is analyzed, not just what to collect.  As you know, the matter of understanding racial and ethnic disparities in law enforcement is not new.  Best practices about how to analyze the data in a matter to truly understand disparities already exists.

More specifically, the data need to be analyzed to tell a story of what is happening within each ethnicity at each decision point.  For example, the data should be explained this way (these are made up numbers to illustrate my point):

1.  There are 500 (3% of general population) African Americans in Boulder.
2.  125 (25%) African Americans experienced a traffic stop in Boulder.
3.  Of the 125 African Americans who experienced a traffic stop in Boulder, 75 (60%) of them had a search of their vehicle.
4.  Of the 125 African Americans who experienced a traffic stop in Boulder, 80 (64%) were referred to Boulder County Court.

If you do this for each ethnicity, you will start to see how the proportion changes at each decision point.  For lack of a better way of saying it, a community might see that the concentration of people of color grows as the decision points go further into the justice system.


I am asking if some of this analysis could be available for tonight's discussion.  I think this approach brings out better what disparities may exist for some in Boulder.  

Thanks

Lisa

Lisa Morzel,
Member, Boulder City Council

303-815-6723
720-530-4080

"We interact with one another as individuals responding to a complex haze of factors: professional responsibilities, personal likes and dislikes, ambition, jealousy, self-interest, and, in at least some instances, genuine altruism.  Living in the here and now, we are awash with sensations of the present, memories of the past, and expectations and fears for the future. Our actions are not determined by any one cause; they are the fulfillment of who we are at that particular moment.  After that moment passes, we continue to evolve, to change, and our memories of that moment inevitably change with us as we live with the consequences of our past actions, consequences we were unaware of at the time." The Last Stand, Nathaniel Philbrick