Award Information
Description of original award (Fiscal Year 2018, $1,111,000)
The National Crime Statistics Exchange (NCS-X) is an effort to expand the FBIs National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) into a nationally representative system of incident-based crime statistics. BJS and the FBI are implementing NCS-X with the support of other Department of Justice agencies, including the Office for Victims of Crime. The goal of NCS-X is to enroll a sample of 400 scientifically selected law enforcement agencies to submit data to NIBRS; when these 400 new NIBRS-reporting agencies are combined with the more than 6,600 agencies that currently report to NIBRS, the nation will have a nationally representative system of incident-based crime statistics drawn from the operational data systems of local police departments. These incident-based data will draw upon the attributes and circumstances of criminal incidents and allow for more detailed and transparent descriptions of crime in communities. The current mechanism by which local law enforcement (LE) agencies report data to the FBIs NIBRS, in general, is for local LE agencies to submit data to their state UCR reporting program, and then for the state UCR program to report those data to the FBI. While the FBI does accept NIBRS data directly from a small number of law enforcement agencies, the highly preferred route of reporting is through the state UCR program. The FY2018 solicitation furthers the goals of the NCS-X initiative by providing funding to the remaining states and local agencies in the NCS-X sample in order to assist them transition to NIBRS reporting.
The State of Texas, Office of the Governor, Criminal Justice Division (CJD) will use NCS-X funds to support thirteen (13) NCS-X sample law enforcement agencies in their transition to NIBRS reporting. Funds will be provided to cover costs directly related to automating processes for capturing and reporting crime incident data and that are minimally essential for the NIBRS transition.
The overall goal of the project is for CJD to provide funding to local agencies to automate processes for capturing and reporting crime incident data. The objective is for those agencies to report more accurate and timely crime incident data to the state UCR Program.
Agencies that receive funding must agree to-
1. Establish and maintain regular communication with the state UCR Program (housed in the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS)), to ensure the local agency's incident based crime data are compliant with state IBR requirements;
2. Test IBR data submissions with the state UCR Program in order to obtain official
certification to report data to the state;
3. Report state !BR-compliant data within two years of project start date; and
4. Provide status reports to CJD, to include updates on expenditures and project
completion.
CJD, in coordination with TX DPS, will work with the pass-through agencies through their IBR transition and the Texas IBR certification process within the grant period. Assisting these sample agencies will also support the larger national transition to IBR by January 2021, which the FBI established as the deadline for all law enforcement agencies and state UCR programs to transition to NIBRS.
CA/NCF