Title
Resolution directing the Bureau of Police to take immediate steps to improve its data collection and the publication thereof in such a manner that meets specific disaggregation criteria, making any necessary and appropriate changes to its internal operating procedures to comply with the contents of this Resolution.
Body
Now, therefore be it resolved by the Council of the City of Pittsburgh as follows:
Section 1. PURPOSE
A. Per § 162.04(a) and § 162.04(b) of Title One: Administrative, Article VII: Procedures, Chapter 162: Open Data Sets of the Code of Ordinances, respectively:
1. “Each department shall be responsible for creating an open data catalogue, which will include comprehensive inventories of information possessed and/or managed by the department;” and
2. “Each department's open data catalogue will classify information holdings as currently ‘public,’ ‘not yet public,’ or ‘exempt;’ departments will work with the Department of Innovation and Performance to develop strategies and timelines for publishing open data containing information in a way that is complete, reliable, and has a high level of detail.”
B. § 116.02(V) of Title One: Administrative, Article III: Organization, Chapter 116: Department of Public Safety of the Code of Ordinances establishes the minimum reporting requirements for an annual police service report to the public to be published by the Bureau of Police.
C. The public October 2020 report, hereafter referred to as “the Report,” by the Pittsburgh Community Task Force for Police Reform recommended that the Bureau of Police take additional steps to make incident-related data more readily accessible to the public.
Section 2. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
A. The Bureau of Police is hereby directed to take immediate steps to improve its data collection and the publication thereof in such a manner that meets specific disaggregation criteria, making any necessary and appropriate changes to its internal operating procedures to comply with the contents of this Resolution.
B. Data on the following shall be collected:
1. Pedestrian stops, uses of force and physical restraints, citations issued, warnings issued, summonses issued, and, comparatively, misdemeanor arrests and felony arrests.
2. Notation by officers of:
a. Reasons for traffic stops, pedestrian stops, arrests, and other actions taken by the Bureau of Police, including delineation of arrests by offense type; and
b. The specific factual basis for presence of probable cause and reasonable suspicion and when the aforementioned is used for arrests, stops, and searches.
C. Upon its collection, the data described in this Section shall, subsequently, be analyzed and reviewed in such a way that disaggregates it into subpopulations of race and gender.
1. Data on all events that include a search of persons or property shall also be further analyzed to produce a determination of the rate at which officers discover contraband through said search, as well as the nature and, when application, the quantity of the contraband in question, also disaggregated into subpopulations of race and gender.
2. Data on stops, searches, and arrests shall also be analyzed so as compare the rates of those instances involving non-white and white juveniles and non-white and white adults, respectively.
D. This data will be analyzed to determine the strategies, activities, tactics, programs, or policies that produce or contribute to racial disparities for which non-racial explanations or causes cannot be accounted.
1. Any possible population bias revealed or suggested by this analysis shall be reviewed, in part, by using the most recent of five-year annual averages compiled and disseminated by the American Community Survey in lieu of single-year Census population data.
Section 3. PUBLICATION
A. To further the cause of identifying and eliminating racial disparities in routine actions and making the data and analyses enumerated in Section 2 available to the public, the Bureau of Police shall publish this information through both interactive data dashboards and written reports presented in plain language.
1. Plain language shall be considered writing that is clear, concise, well-organized, and follows other best practices appropriate to the subject or field and intended audience, wherein best practices include:
a. Being clear and concise, including only important and directly relevant information;
b. Using simple language, written for an eighth grade audience;
c. Defining the purpose of the material;
d. Understanding and writing for the audience, taking into consideration their needs and presumed knowledge about the topic;
e. Using the active voice;
f. Keeping sentences and paragraphs short;
g. Organizing material in a logical order;
h. Designing the material with headings, space, and bulleted lists, and other features where necessary to make information easy to find; and
i. Making any submission, request, or other user-involved process clear, intuitive, and as easy as possible to manipulate and utilize.
2. Published material shall not contain any data that, if published in such a manner, to such a degree that it mitigates the benefit to the public of publishing it, may:
a. Infringe on reasonable expectations of privacy and confidentiality;
b. Raise security concerns; or
c. Jeopardize public health, safety, or welfare.
B. Published data sets shall meet the requirements of this Resolution and the open data standards of Title One: Administrative, Article VII: Procedures, Chapter 162: Open Data Sets of the Code of Ordinances.
C. The findings of data analysis conducted to determine the strategies, activities, tactics, programs, or policies that produce or contribute to racial disparities for which non-racial explanations or causes cannot be accounted shall be published on a bi-monthly basis.
1. This report shall detail the ameliorative actions that the Bureau of Police is taking or will take, thereby making available to the public information on current or planned remedies.
Section 4. SEVERABILITY.
A. If any one or more of the provisions of this Resolution shall, for any reason, be held to be illegal or invalid, such illegality or invalidity shall not affect any other provisions of this Resolution and this Resolution shall be construed and enforced as if such illegal or invalid provisions had not been contained herein.