I am transfixed by my daily e-mail from EveryBlock.com, a hyperlocal Web site, detailing news about my immediate North Side neighborhood, notably crimes. Typical are these entries:
“Location: 800 block W. Montrose Ave. Crime date: April 20, 2010. Case number: HS267947. Crime time: 10:45 p.m. Primary type: Criminal trespass. Secondary type: Criminal trespass. Place: Residence (porch/hallway). Beat: 2313. Domestic: No.”
“Location: 4200 block N. Greenview Ave. Crime date: April 23, 2010. Case number: HS272500. Crime time: 9 a.m. Primary type: Theft. Secondary type: Theft $300 and under. Place: Residence. Beat: 1922. Domestic: No.”
As much as I love EveryBlock, the disclosures are unsatisfying because they’re so skimpy. Compare them with what EveryBlock mavens get in Charlotte, N.C.:
“Location: 100 Block of E. Trade St. Incident date: Feb. 28, 2010. Incident type: Assault with a deadly weapon — with injury. Complaint number: 20100228030301. Description: The victims were stabbed during a fight in the street at the above address. The victims were treated on the scene by medic and transported to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The two male victims described a short black male suspect to officers. Incident time: 3:03 a.m.”
The difference involves the crime description in Charlotte. In Chicago, the police department declines to make any details available online to us or to EveryBlock, a five-member operation based here. EveryBlock was bought last year by MSNBC.com and cranks out daily updates for neighborhoods in 15 other cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Washington and Dallas.
The site’s frustration with Chicago underscores how scant our access is to public records at most levels of government.
Take the city’s Department of Public Health. It stopped updating its Web site last year. That means that for months, citizens haven’t been able to find out about, say, what restaurants have been hit with violations. In part, the department blames technological problems.
EveryBlock is the brainchild of soft-spoken, angular Adrian Holovaty, 29, well-known in the online world for innovations in computer code. He retains oversight and, with two colleagues, operates out of an airy but bare Ravenswood loft about a mile north of Wrigley Field.
Mr. Holovaty is asking his audience here to sign a petition, to prod the Chicago Police Department to change its ways. He links to the petition from each crime. “Would you like to see more information about this crime? So would we!” he asks.
The city is a national trendsetter via CLEARpath, an interactive police department Web site, which has been cited for innovation by the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. It averages four million page views a month. But Mr. Holovaty does have some valid points.
It’s one thing to know there was a $300 theft down the street; it’s another to read the police officer’s description. “Clearly, there’s a huge difference between a random break-in and, say, an ex-boyfriend breaking into an apartment to get his stuff,” Mr. Holovaty says.
We can get those details if we go to the police station. But the department won’t make descriptions available online. The end result is ignorance, possibly about the real dangers in a neighborhood. Lack of context can breed fear and needless anxiety.
Chicago is not alone in arguing that there are privacy concerns, notably names of victims, and what can be raw descriptions replete with misspellings. But Mr. Holovaty underscores that EveryBlock, as a matter of policy, does not run people’s names on any of its listings, be they crimes, real estate transactions or granting of business licenses.
Further, he says he could devise algorithmic solutions to dealing with privacy issues like bad spelling and raw language. But he meets resistance.
“The trend in the law is fairly robust when it comes to access for the public,” said Eve Burton, vice president and general counsel for the Hearst Corporation. “But the practice among those implementing the laws is less good, and media companies are no longer putting the time, energy and resources into being the watchdog of government.”
If government wanted to live up to its obligations, technology could make everything from crime reports to restaurant inspections available. But instead, the cat-and-mouse game will continue, with government preferring secrecy and the likes of Mr. Holovaty banging on doors, or at least their data servers.
by JAMES WARREN | May 7, 2010
I am transfixed by my daily e-mail from EveryBlock.com, a hyperlocal Web site, detailing news about my immediate North Side neighborhood, notably crimes. Typical are these entries:
“Location: 800 block W. Montrose Ave. Crime date: April 20, 2010. Case number: HS267947. Crime time: 10:45 p.m. Primary type: Criminal trespass. Secondary type: Criminal trespass. Place: Residence (porch/hallway). Beat: 2313. Domestic: No.”
“Location: 4200 block N. Greenview Ave. Crime date: April 23, 2010. Case number: HS272500. Crime time: 9 a.m. Primary type: Theft. Secondary type: Theft $300 and under. Place: Residence. Beat: 1922. Domestic: No.”
As much as I love EveryBlock, the disclosures are unsatisfying because they’re so skimpy. Compare them with what EveryBlock mavens get in Charlotte, N.C.:
“Location: 100 Block of E. Trade St. Incident date: Feb. 28, 2010. Incident type: Assault with a deadly weapon — with injury. Complaint number: 20100228030301. Description: The victims were stabbed during a fight in the street at the above address. The victims were treated on the scene by medic and transported to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The two male victims described a short black male suspect to officers. Incident time: 3:03 a.m.”
The difference involves the crime description in Charlotte. In Chicago, the police department declines to make any details available online to us or to EveryBlock, a five-member operation based here. EveryBlock was bought last year by MSNBC.com and cranks out daily updates for neighborhoods in 15 other cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Washington and Dallas.
The site’s frustration with Chicago underscores how scant our access is to public records at most levels of government.
Take the city’s Department of Public Health. It stopped updating its Web site last year. That means that for months, citizens haven’t been able to find out about, say, what restaurants have been hit with violations. In part, the department blames technological problems.
EveryBlock is the brainchild of soft-spoken, angular Adrian Holovaty, 29, well-known in the online world for innovations in computer code. He retains oversight and, with two colleagues, operates out of an airy but bare Ravenswood loft about a mile north of Wrigley Field.
Mr. Holovaty is asking his audience here to sign a petition, to prod the Chicago Police Department to change its ways. He links to the petition from each crime. “Would you like to see more information about this crime? So would we!” he asks.
The city is a national trendsetter via CLEARpath, an interactive police department Web site, which has been cited for innovation by the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. It averages four million page views a month. But Mr. Holovaty does have some valid points.
It’s one thing to know there was a $300 theft down the street; it’s another to read the police officer’s description. “Clearly, there’s a huge difference between a random break-in and, say, an ex-boyfriend breaking into an apartment to get his stuff,” Mr. Holovaty says.
We can get those details if we go to the police station. But the department won’t make descriptions available online. The end result is ignorance, possibly about the real dangers in a neighborhood. Lack of context can breed fear and needless anxiety.
Chicago is not alone in arguing that there are privacy concerns, notably names of victims, and what can be raw descriptions replete with misspellings. But Mr. Holovaty underscores that EveryBlock, as a matter of policy, does not run people’s names on any of its listings, be they crimes, real estate transactions or granting of business licenses.
Further, he says he could devise algorithmic solutions to dealing with privacy issues like bad spelling and raw language. But he meets resistance.
“The trend in the law is fairly robust when it comes to access for the public,” said Eve Burton, vice president and general counsel for the Hearst Corporation. “But the practice among those implementing the laws is less good, and media companies are no longer putting the time, energy and resources into being the watchdog of government.”
If government wanted to live up to its obligations, technology could make everything from crime reports to restaurant inspections available. But instead, the cat-and-mouse game will continue, with government preferring secrecy and the likes of Mr. Holovaty banging on doors, or at least their data servers.