| Summary: | The aim of this study was to provide a systematic empirical assessment of three basic organizational premises of Community-Oriented Policing (COP). This study constructed a comprehensive data set by synthesizing data available in separate national data sets on police agencies and communities. The base data source used was the 1999 Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) survey [LAW ENFORCEMENT MANAGEMENT AND ADMINISTRATIVE STATISTICS (LEMAS), 1999 (ICPSR 3079)], which contained data on police organizational characteristics and on adoption of community-oriented policing procedures. The 1999 survey was supplemented with additional organizational variables from the 1997 LEMAS survey [LAW ENFORCEMENT MANAGEMENT AND ADMINISTRATIVE STATISTICS (LEMAS), 1997 (ICPSR 2700)] and from the 1996 Directory of Law Enforcement Agencies [DIRECTORY OF LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES, 1996: [UNITED STATES] (ICPSR 2260)]. Data on community characteristics were extracted from the 1994 County and City Data Book, from the 1996 to 1999 Uniform Crime Reports [UNIFORM CRIME REPORTING PROGRAM DATA. [UNITED STATES]: OFFENSES KNOWN AND CLEARANCES BY ARREST (1996-1997: ICPSR 9028, 1998: ICPSR 2904, 1999: ICPSR 3158)], from the 1990 and 2000 Census Gazetteer files, and from Rural-Urban Community classifications. The merging of the separate data sources was accomplished by using the Law Enforcement Agency Identifiers Crosswalk file [LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCY IDENTIFIERS CROSSWALK [UNITED STATES], 1996 (ICPSR 2876)]. In all, 23 data files from eight separate sources collected by four different governmental agencies were used to create the merged data set. The entire merging process resulted in a combined final sample of 3,005 local general jurisdiction policing agencies. Variables for this study provide information regarding police organizational structure include type of government, type of agency, and number and various types of employees. Several indices from the LEMAS surveys are also provided. Community-oriented policing variables are the percent of full-time sworn employees assigned to COP positions, if the agency had a COP plan, and several indices from the 1999 LEMAS survey. Community context variables include various Census population categories, rural-urban continuum (Beale) codes, urban influence codes, and total serious crime rate for different year ranges. Geographic variables include FIPS State, county, and place codes, and region.
|
|---|
