Laredo PD Saves 24 Hours of Time on Each Investigation
May 06, 2024 by Kate Nadolski
As anyone working in law enforcement knows, saving time is crucial in a mission-critical situation. That’s why the Laredo Police Department in Texas adopted elevated processes to improve policing and save time on all investigations.
To do this, Laredo PD began optimizing cloud-hosted public safety tools for data collection, storage, and analysis.
Officer Stephen Garza said the decision to implement Enterprise Law Enforcement Records stemmed from the need to combat rising crime within the jurisdiction.
“With an increase of crime in certain parts of the city, we wanted to present actual numbers to our city council and other entities, so they could see what and where this was happening and in turn, help us to gain more resources like personnel and equipment to combat this issue,” Garza said.
With the agency’s former solutions, officers could only see incidents, calls for service, arrests, and cases in a raw data format, leaving them with little to work with in terms of identifying crime trends and creating action plans to combat this crime.
With Enterprise Law Enforcement Records, Laredo PD has put the data to work for the good of the agency and the community.
Garza said trends and hot spot areas of crime are extremely easy to identify and track through various charts, graphs, and heat maps. The timing component stands out as a ‘wow’ factor as Garza explains how much time they can save with these tools.
“After consulting with our analyst, we learned that our overall workflow through records went from five days to only two days to conduct a thorough analysis. That’s three whole work days of time that is saved for each investigation,” Garza said. “With more time, the agency can focus on more research and try to visualize incoming issues ahead of us, allowing us to practice proactive policing.”
It’s not just the time saved, but numbers that Laredo PD shared that speak volumes.
In October 2023, Laredo experienced many firearm-related incidents in specific areas of the city. The agency identified hot spots from a heat map within their records system. These hot spots became target areas for proactive policing.
As a result, Laredo PD experienced a 19% decrease in firearm related incidents in those target areas.
“We love to see results and this type of analysis and response is being conducted consistently to improve our crime rates overall,” Garza said.
The benefits of using data as a powerful tool extend beyond crime.
The city of Laredo was experiencing a rise in mental health crisis calls, the agency launched efforts within its technology to expand the department’s mental health unit to get people the help they needed.
Three police officers were assigned to the mental health unit and tasked with reaching out to appropriate facilities and doctors to provide a specialized response to those in crisis situations.
Garza said the department is working to add three more officers to this unit and is planning on using reports and analytics to provide a visual that can help vouch for the need of these extra officers.
Lastly, the Laredo PD has used records and analytics to improve traffic safety.
Garza said it’s common for his agency to utilize technology to identify roads in the city that have high rates of crashes.
One road in the northeast part of the city has been the location of several fatal crashes. Laredo identified this stretch of road by viewing accident reports over a period of time on a map and noticed the large number of crashes in that one specific area.
As a result, the agency increased the police presence in this area, added concrete barriers between the northbound and southbound parts of the road, and readjusted its structure from three lanes to two lanes.
Garza said these capabilities have supported his agency in making strides in proactive policing and keeping the community safe.
“These tools allow us to help the community because we can visually see what the residents need on these analytic reports and heat maps and provide an appropriate response to meet their needs,” Garza said.