At your fingertips: Oakland crime info

Emilie Raguso Sun, 7 Feb at 8:57pm
http://oakland.crimespotting.org

After reporting on an upcoming gang injunction last week, I started to get more interested in what information is available about crime in Oakland.

The police have Came across an amazing interactive Web site, Oakland Crimespotting, that has all kinds of fascinating information. The most awesome feature, in my opinion, is that you can find the beat where you live and sign up for RSS notifications of all crime reports in the neighborhood. Pretty cool!!

I also came across an interesting report on the Web site of the Rockridge neighborhood watch group (aka the Rockridge Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council) from its December meeting. Click to view the PDF. I learned that my beat has the highest concentration of street robberies in north Oakland. Good to know.

About Emilie Raguso
Emilie Raguso's picture
Emilie Raguso is a multimedia reporter in Oakland who focuses on issues of criminal justice, food and Oakland culture. She is passionate about social media, documentary photography and sustainable living. Her work has appeared on Salon and NPR, as well as in The Modesto Bee, Greater Good magazine and the East Bay Express. Write her at eraguso@gmail.com, follow her on Twitter (@emraguso) and see more of her work at http://raguso.us.
Peter Rafanan's picture
Peter Rafanan commented 4 weeks 2 days ago

It would be nice if the City or Police Department could operate a site like Crimespotting, but let's be clear... they cannot!  This site is designed and maintained by well meaning community members.  Thanks to Stamen Designs - Michal, Tom and Eric.  This is an incredible resource.

Emilie Raguso's picture
Emilie Raguso commented 4 weeks 2 days ago

thanks for the clarification! it's an awesome site!

Nelly O'Neille's picture
Nelly O'Neille commented 4 weeks 1 day ago

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CB Smith-Dahl's picture
CB Smith-Dahl commented 4 weeks 6 hours ago

Just thought I'd chime in to provide a little background here. Oakland's PD actually does post this information online on a site called Oakland Crimewatch. I first became aware of this site in 2005 or 2006, so it's been around for a bit.

Oakland Crimewatch is built using a wonderful set of tools known as GIS which, like much of the web nowadays, can be hacked and rehashed by others. I tip my hat to the local gov folks for using GIS for the site.

Oakland Crimespotting is what's known as a mash-up. The folks over at Stamen Design thought they could take the data on the City of Oakland/Oakland PD map and create a better interface. Thus was born Oakland Crimespotting.

Maps are a wonderful way to get to know a neighborhood better and I would encourage all Oakland Local readers to learn more about user made maps - whether using GIS tools, GoogleMaps/Google Earth, or Yelp. They are all ways we can highlight both good and bad things in our neighborhoods.

(The reason I know about all this is I've been working on a positive mapping project with some youth in Oakland. I will be sure to post that project on Oakland Local when it's done.)

CB Smith-Dahl's picture
CB Smith-Dahl commented 4 weeks 6 hours ago

Oh, and ps - there are some really cool Census Mashups out there. Here's a really cool one by Andrew Trice from 2007. Enter your own zip for local info. I'm sure there will be more rolling out after the 2010 Census as well.

 

Emilie Raguso's picture
Emilie Raguso commented 4 weeks 6 hours ago

thanks for the tip! good to know.