Quality of Life

Safe Community

Obtain Safest City Designation

Due: December 2021

Principle: Possessing the “Gold Standard” in public safety by meeting and exceeding standards set forth through the Commission of Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies to assist with the designation of one of the safest communities in Colorado.

Description

Implemented to improve the overall quality of crime data collected by law enforcement, the National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) captures details on each single crime incident—as well as on separate offenses within the same incident—including information on victims, known offenders, relationships between victims and offenders, arrestees, and property involved in crimes. Unlike data reported through the UCR Program’s traditional Summary Reporting System (SRS)—an aggregate monthly tally of crimes—NIBRS goes much deeper because of its ability to provide circumstances and context for crimes like location, time of day, and whether the incident was cleared.

As recommended by professional law enforcement organizations, the FBI has made nationwide implementation of NIBRS a top priority because NIBRS can provide more useful statistics to promote constructive discussion, measured planning, and informed policing. The Arvada Police Department began submitting incident (NIBRS) data to the FBI on 1/1/2006.

Significance

The vision for NIBRS is for it to become the law enforcement community’s standard for quantifying crime, which will help law enforcement and communities around the country use resources more strategically and effectively. 

In 2018, approximately 44% of U.S. law enforcement agencies that participated in the UCR Program submitted data via NIBRS. Since then, the FBI has received thousands of commitments from law enforcement across the nation to be NIBRS-compliant by 2021. Ultimately, the national transition to NIBRS will further support the mission of the FBI’s UCR Program to generate reliable information for use in law enforcement administration, operation, and management.

Analysis

2019 crime data is not yet available on the FBI/NIBRS website. This strategic reuslts will be updated as soon as information is  available.

Colorado's Safest Cities, Large And Small: Report (based on 2018 NIBRS data)

A new study ranks the safest cities and towns in Colorado. Analysts used FBI crime data for the ranking, which categorizes cities and towns by population. Arvada is the 3rd safest large city in Colorado, according to a report. The report included a ranking for violent and property crimes from 11 large cities, 34 mid-sized cities and 82 towns.

Centennial is the safest large city in Colorado, followed by Fort Collins and Arvada, respectively, according to the AdvisorSmith report. Analysts weighed different crimes — such as theft, assault and robbery — based on their severity. The largest Colorado cities in the ranking all had more than 100,000 residents. Pueblo is the least-safe city in our state, the study shows. Out of 82 mid-size cities analyzed in the study, Glendale was ranked last.


Work System
Performance Measures

Crime Rate

Crime Rate - Description

This performance measure focuses on comparing crime rates in Arvada to other front range municipalities, a national average and ICMA data. Crime in the United States is an annual publication in which the FBI compiles the volume and rate of violent and property crime offenses for the nation by state. Crime data are submitted either through a state Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program or directly to the FBI’s UCR Program. 


Maintaining a city safe from crime continues to be identified through the Community Survey as the most important function of City government. 


Crime Rate - Significance

The City of Arvada is committed to providing a safe place for people to live, visit and conduct business. 

It is important for community members to feel safe and to be safe.

Crime Rate - Analysis

For 2019, Arvada has the third lowest crime rate.   According to rates based on population; Arvada has approximately 32 crimes per 1000 people.

Crime Rate - Data Source

Crime Rate - the ratio of crimes in an area to the population of that area; expressed per 1000 population per year. 


Arvada and all other municipality benchmark data comes from Crime in the United States document published each fall by the FBI. Please note that results are always lagging because of the time needed for reporting by the FBI.


ICMA data is provided through the ClearPoint Library


Code Compliance

Code Compliance - Description

 This performance measure analyzes data from the community customer relations management (CRM) system called Ask Arvada. 


Community members use the CRM to inform the city of potential code violations. Code Enforcement Officers are required to City Ordinances with regard to enforcement and providing time for residents to bring their property into compliance. Cases that require legal action through the Arvada Municipal Court  are bound by set timelines. 


The CRM tracks all requests from submission to case closure. Cases fall into "compliance" or  "summons" categories.

Code Compliance - Significance

The City's goal is to preserve our communities for a lifetime.  To achieve this, a City must maintain and enhance existing commercial and residential areas. Code Enforcement responds to and resolves enforcement issues, provides customer service and pro-actively removes illegal signage from the City right-of-way. 


Code Enforcement helps ensure a safe community and a high quality living environment for the residents of Arvada by implementing and enforcing nuisance codes and zoning ordinances. 

Code Compliance - Analysis

The number of closed requests has increased this quarter due to several factors such as some of the restrictions being lifted from the pandemic, availability of resources, active court proceedings, and increased compliance checks. The Police Service Technician assigned to Code Enforcement to handle abandoned vehicles has also assisted greatly in increasing this closure rate as these types of complaints frequently come through the Ask Arvada system.  

Code Compliance - Data Source

Ask Arvada - Citywide CRM system