Standardizing for Success

The WADEPS dashboard is an incident-based tool for analyzing and comparing the use of force. A key strength of the system is the standardization of both use-of-force incident data points and call type labels for all community-police interactions.

In Washington, 78 public safety answering points (PSAPs)—also known as dispatch centers—provide support to 301 local, county, state, and tribal law enforcement agencies by tracking and managing on-duty officer activity with a computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system.

Each PSAP is an independent organization and their CAD dispatch codes, event types, and incident labels can be independent of each other, too.

CAD Data Ingestion

When limited incident-level CAD data is received by WADEPS, the standardized dispatch code mapping enables the data to be automatically ingested to the data warehouse and displayed on the data dashboard. This provides agency-specific data to the public in a timely, accurate, and useful format.

Comparing Apples to Apples

In order to calculate comparable incident-based rates of force based on community contacts, WADEPS is mapping each agency and PSAP’s call type labels to a corresponding incident type and incident detail listed in the approved data dictionary.

The WADEPS Initial Incident Types (1.9a) are:

Offense against person
Property offense
Public order offense
Vehicle stop
Pedestrian stop
Civil caretaking
Warrant
Other

The WADEPS data dictionary, including the incident types and incident details, was established by the Office of the Attorney General. Further refinement requires legislative action.

The Initial Incident Detail options (1.9b), such as DUI for vehicle stop or burglary for property offense, provide additional context for each CAD event and reportable use-of-force shared with WADEPS.

Process and Example

Data Mapping Process

1. Agencies and/or PSAPs provide WADEPS with their full call type dictionary. Only one file per agency or PSAPS is necessary. If a PSAP uses the same call type labels for all agencies it supports, only one file is necessary.

2. WADEPS compares call type labels to the WADEPS incident types and incident details in the data dictionary and determines the appropriate equivalency.

Dispatch calls for administrative and non-community engagement tasks or incidents, such as motor pool assignments, are not included in the WADEPS data dictionary and will not be mapped.

3. Agencies and PSAPs will be asked to review their mapped results and provide clarification where needed.

Example of Data Mapping

Image of a sample spread sheet with five columns labeled Dispatch Code, Primary Description, Secondary Description if available, WADEPS Initial Incident Type (1.9a), and WADEPS Initial Incident Detail (1.9b).

Submit CAD call type files for mapping

Excel or CSV format required. Include your organization name in the file name.

–> Upload from a PSAP or Dispatch Center

–> Upload from a law enforcement agency

Why CAD Mapping is Important

Dispatch code mapping for CAD data will allow for meaningful agency-to-agency comparisons and accessible interpretation of large volumes of data

Public accessibility to and understanding of data is a core mission of the WADEPS project. Dispatch codes, acronyms, and abbreviations can be difficult to interpret, especially in large volumes and when the incoming data employs different systems of categorization.

Dispatch code mapping improves the public digestibility of police agency data by simplifying call types and incident-based data using language and naming conventions that can be more easily understood by the public.

Additionally, agency-to-agency comparisons must be appropriate to be meaningful. With hundreds of agencies and multiple variables—such as the number of officers, budget, population and physical area served—standardization of incident-based CAD data through dispatch code mapping improves the quality and accuracy of inferences drawn from the data and encourages “apple to apples” comparisons of similar agencies.