MOLDY CITY

The miracle city thing, that's just Ray talking..."It's a miracle we're still here." The miracle is he's still here.
Rob Couhig on Ray Nagin

Rob Couhig has either forgotten about his own role in Nagin's re-election or has a somewhat elevated opinion of his own capabilities. In a rant that begins about eleven minutes into this morning's (7/20/07) 7 a.m. show, Couhig actually goes so far as to say that he doesn't believe a word that the mayor says. He also has harsh words for almost every member of the city council.

Frankly, Couhig should do what he'd advise others to do -- examine the situation and determine what he can do to improve it. He can't do anything about his role in Nagin's re-election, but he can do something about the credibility he lent to Nagin's claims of having brought transparency and accountability to city government. He could start by reading this Picayune editorial that finally appeared online weeks after it was published. The editors pulled their punches, but it was a start. I'm still trying to figure out why it was placed on the bottom of the page on a Saturday and took so long to get online. Had it been published on a weekday, it would have been discussed on talk radio and possibly had some impact. I can only assume that the editors of the Picayune felt compelled to say something but were afraid to say it too loudly. It was the journalistic equivalent of an objection muttered under one's breath.

Also, I didn't have any luck testing something I read in today's paper:

With a couple of keystrokes and mouse clicks, residents can now get a clearer picture of crime in their New Orleans neighborhood.

The New Orleans Police Department unveiled Thursday an improved Web site mapping tool that plots crime on a map.

The tool, found at the bottom of the police Web site at www.nopd.com, allows users to type in any address in the city. From there, they can search for specific crimes, zoom in and out on specific neighborhoods and tally incidents dating back to Jan. 1, 2005.

The Web site reads:

Once you enter the site, you will be able to enter an address and submit a form which will display a map. You will notice a red square which indicates the house or location you entered. At the top of that map you will see several labels, one of which is titled "City Services". This label will provide a link to four city services; 311, EMS, Fire, and Police. You need only click on the department you choose to obtain data in relation to the address you entered.

Maybe I'm doing something incorrectly, but I didn't have any luck with any of the addresses that I thought would be worth checking. For one thing, the site only listed 311, EMS and Fire, but an error message (finally) appeared every time I tried either 311 or crime maps. Maybe I'm just too sleepy to decipher web page instructions.

Update: The last link above is to Tulane University's Office of Public Safety; it seemed like it would be a good tool to spot check the NOPD maps:

Off Campus Reports
The following crime incidents have been reported to Tulane and Loyola Departments of Public Safety. The incidents have also been reported to the New Orleans Police Department.

Considering how few students are in town this time of year (relatively few incidents to report) and the fact that it seemed like an obvious way to double check the maps, I thought that I was setting the bar pretty low. I tried it again at 8:30 this morning (Sunday), the city services link still doesn't list "police," and I still got an error message when I tried 311 or the (separate) crime maps link. Last night at small dinner get-together, I asked somebody who does volunteer work with the NOPD about the maps (in the cross-talk, I missed my chance to ask her my favorite NOPD-related question); she thought the site might have been overloaded since the article appeared. However, I wouldn't expect that to be the case at 8:30 on a Sunday morning. Somebody else interjected that the instructions didn't make any sense. This leads to the obvious question of whether reporters test the information that they're given about the city website or do they just watch a demonstration? Do they even watch a demonstration, which I would argue is insufficient, or do they just read a press release?

Schroeder gives a helpful link in the comments. The crime map is a volunteer effort, and we all should all be grateful for the work that they're doing. However, it does seem to miss several armed robberies, at least by the spot check that I used. Sorry to point that out, but I think that the number of armed robberies is, in some ways, more telling than the homicide rate. It's always, or almost always, a stranger crime with an "innocent" victim and the main variable (a large one, I'd guess) is the victim's likelihood of reporting it. That would also hold true for sex crimes, and the stated reason for not publishing information --victim's privacy issues -- seems a little fishy. There are obvious reasons not to report that a rape occurred at 31415 Constant Street, but that shouldn't prevent the NOPD fromm informing the public that somebody was raped near the intersection of Constant and Pie.

Labels: crime maps; Rob Couhig; Nagin