(February 17, 2004) -- Just weeks before City Council elections (in district 2, 4, 6 and 8), the City of LB has changed its long-standing crime-reporting policy and is no longer releasing annual crime statistics sorted by City Council districts.

LBPD Public Information Officer Greg Schirmer told LBReport.com that Council district crime data will no longer be provided because there were inaccuracies when reporting the data by Council districts. LBPD records crimes using its own, neighborhood-size reporting districts...and some of LBPD's reporting districts are divided across Council district boundaries.

On February 6, the City Manager's office issued a press release (reported by LBReport.com) that indicated LB's overall (i.e. citywide) crime totals declined in 2003. However as LBReport.com has previously noted, citywide data have an unavoidable shortcoming: they can mask disproportionately crime-impacted areas because citywide data necessarily combine high and low crime areas.

LBPD will continue to make its neighborhood size reporting district crime data publicly available...and now posts monthly and semi-annual data on LBPD's web site.

As we have done for several years, LBReport.com will be posting the annual neighborhood data when available.