Crime Rate in Omaha When Compared to Other Cities

Crime Rate in Omaha When Compared to Other Cities

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Institution of Affiliation

Contents

Abstract 2

Introduction. 2

Literature Review.. 4

Proposed Theoretical Model 6

Research Design. 7

Data Collection and Subjects. 7

Limitations. 7

Ethical Considerations. 8

Expected Outcomes – Analysis Significance. 8

Data Analysis. 9

Results. 9

Conclusion. 13

References. 15

Abstract

Omaha is one of the largest city in the United Stands and houses some the top companies such as Pacific Corporation and Berkshire Hathaway. Therefore, it is imperative that crime is controlled to create a safe environment for both investors and residents. To understand the distribution of prevalence of crime in the city, this study assembles crime data from the fbi.org website and organize it give the changes in rates over the years. It uses the various types of crime including robbery, murder, aggravated assault, rape, motor vehicle theft, burglary and other forms of theft. It uses raw counts from the website as recorded from 2013 to 2017. In addition, the study compares the rates with five other cities with similar population size to Omaha. It uses quantitative technique to collect and analyze data and present in tables. Analyses of the tables indicate that crime rates in Omaha have been increasing with a 5.21 percent increase recorded in 2017. Other cities have seen their crime rates decrease over the years with Miami recording the highest decrease of 18.1 percent. The study leads to a conclusion that Omaha city has devastating crime ratings thereby authenticating the need for the police department to restrategize to salvage the situation.

Introduction

As chief police in Omaha City, it is imperative to understand the dynamics of the crime rates in the perspective of the trend in the last five years and comparing the statistics with other cities of similar population size. The type of crimes that would be considered in this research include robbery, murder, aggravated assault, rape, auto theft, burglary, and theft. Omaha is a city in Nebraska with a population size of 466,000; other cities with a similar population size that would be relevant in analysis and comparison include Colorado Springs, Long Beach, Miami, and Virginia Beach. This study will establish whether the police department at Omaha is having an adequate effect on the crime rate when compared to other cities of similar population.

Crime in Omaha has varied widely over the years since early times when Omaha was perceived as a frontier town with widespread activities of prostitution and gambling. As the city grew, civic expectations of higher standards developed with contemporary concerns for violent and property crimes authenticating the need to develop an efficient policing department that would control crimes. As an industrial city going into the 20^th century, shared in the social vices of the cities in the United States that had been accompanied by rapid economic growth and entrant of immigrants (Hull, 1993). Poverty emanating from job loss and discrimination contributed to different crimes as the city was approaching the 21^st century with drug trafficking and abuse becoming linked with violent crime rates after gangs from Los Angeles established affiliates in the city.

Since the 1990s, crime rates have been on the decreasing end in the city with FBI reports indicating that the rate of violent crimes per 100,000 individuals has been lower than the rates of three other cities with similar population size (Greater Omaha Economic Development Council, 2009).  Both violent and property crimes are still a social problem in the city, for instance, a detective by the name Kerrie Orozco was shot dead in 2015 as he went to serve a suspect with an arrest warrant in North Omaha (Womack, 2012). The other officers who had accompanied him shot and killed the suspect. This shows that crime is still rife in the city and analyzing the statistics would help in strategic planning and benchmarking for containment of the situation.

Analysis of the reports on the top ten safest cities in Nebraska omits Omaha in the list. It also emerges that the crime rates in Nebraska are above the national average rates; recent reports indicate 5.43 violent crimes per 1,000 people while the national average was 4.49. Property crimes were no better with the city having 34.26 incidents against the country’s average of 27.11 (Larms.Org, 2019). The study would reveal the details behind these reports and help the police department use more effective strategies through innovation and benchmarking of improved cities. Omaha is the largest city in Nebraska and the county seat for Douglas County. It is the headquarter to five Fortune 500 firms including Union Pacific Corporation, Mutual of Omaha, Kiewit Corporation, and Berkshire Hathaway. It is in position eight on the list of top 50 cities in both Fortune 500 companies, and per capita billionaires in the United States. Therefore, it is imperative to keep crime rates in the city in check to promote more growth and maintain the existing social and business environment. The issues that arise from the research problem include:

Literature Review

Studies indicate that crime in cities is most prevalent in disadvantaged and stressful areas characterized by disproportionate concentration of unemployment, poverty and minority populations (Kershaw and Tseloni, 2005). Two criminal justice theories, routine activity theory and social disorganization theory, have been postulated to interpret the association between crime rates and the city neighborhood contexts. The routine activity theory indicates that criminal actions are linked to the behavior patterns of people living within a particular urban area and the characteristics of the social environment. Three aspects are apparent in perspective of this theory: lack of surveillance or least risk, profitable targets, and abundance of opportunities. The social disorganization theory contends that social and economic stresses such as poverty and ethnic discrimination undermines the level of social control and destroy the foundation for social cohesion, which prompts criminal activities (Jones and Pridemore, 2019).

Previous studies on crime rates in American cities have utilized aggregate data from neighborhood levels such as face blocks, block groups, or census tracts. The recommended research unit is the census tracts, as they compile socioeconomic data for explanation of the various types of crimes in US cities (Krivo and Peterson, 1996). In addition, census tract is large enough to capture satisfactory number of criminal activities within a given period. Past studies have often used official crime rates as a measure of the frequency of crimes at different geographic scales.  In its definition, crime rate encompasses the number of crime incidents in an area standardized by the population at risk, usually expressed as per a thousand people per year. This method is better than raw counts of criminal activities when comparing variations across different cities. Standardized crime rates present a realistic indication of risk of crime as research has concluded that criminals would propagate their activities in communities or cities where they are familiar or live (Ellis and Wash, 2000).

According to FBI reports (2015), all types of crimes had recorded an increase in major cities between 2014 and 2015. Homicide had increased by 3.9 percent while robbery rose by 1.4 percent. While the increase is relatively small, it produces significant effects in the social and economic setups. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that at least 4,270 individuals are treated in emergency departments on daily basis for injuries from assaults. Another study indicated that major cities experienced the highest increase in homicide and manslaughter with 20 percent increase between 2014 and 2015 (Rosenfield, 2016). Comparison of violent crimes by MCCA in the summer of 2016 showed that all violent crimes had seen an increase except rape (Major Cities Chiefs Association, 2016). More than half of the cities recorded an increase in aggravated assaults and homicides.

Studies of the underlying cause of crime in major cities indicate multi-systematic contributors. For instance, law enforcement is not enough to prevent aggravated assault or homicide. The roots of crimes span from all aspects of life and ought to be addressed in all systems of governments. Discriminatory housing policies, faulty educational systems, systematic poverty, and overburdened mental health care system are only some of the factors propagating crime. The criminal justice system and affiliated systems exhibit widespread failure through corruption and ineffectiveness thereby encouraging crime. The causes of crime are not only due to failures in government but also include the sociology, physiology, and psychology of individual members of the society (Green, Horel, and Papachristos, 2017). However, most of the causes fall within the scope of law enforcement which calls for a holistic approach from the government.

Proposed Theoretical Model

The research makes use of the theories of routine activity and social disorganization to access the predispositions to criminal activities among the inhabitants of Omaha. While literature suggest that crime rates are the appropriate analytics in comparing deviations among different cities, raw counts per year gives a clear view of the number of criminal activities in different years. Therefore, both are crucial concepts in this research; they are measurable constructs and thus do not need any conceptualization. The various variables include crime rates by city and by city. Counts of criminal activities categorized into robbery, murder, aggravated assault, rape, auto theft, burglary, and theft. Research often require prediction of the results to through the formulation of a hypothesis that will either be accepted or rejected based on the significance of the sample results. To achieve the objectives of the research, the following hypotheses are formulated:

Research Design

Data Collection and Subjects

This study will use a quantitative approach as data in form of counts would be collected from the fbi.gov website. This technique allows the conversion of quantitative data into usable statistics that can be used to make conclusion regarding the variables and give recommendations for correction of the problem. The data for this study involves recorded counts of robbery, murder, aggravated assault, rape, auto theft, burglary and other forms of theft in the cities of Omaha, Miami, Colorado Springs, Long Beach, and Virginia Beach. While the study is on Omaha, comparison of its crime rates with other cities is imperative. These cities are chosen on the basis of their size; the study looks to use cities of similar population size to Omaha, which has 466, 000. Miami has 470,914, Virginia Beach has 450,189, Long Beach has 467,354, and Colorado Springs has 472,688 people.

Limitations

Crime reporting can vary among the various police stations that provide data to the fbi.gov website. It is frequently noted that police under-report and under-record crime thereby making the available data not an actual representation of the events in the neighborhoods. This would lead to erroneous conclusion and subsequent failure of the recommendations. The crime reporting due to factors such as local policing or population culture that lack tolerance on particular issues. When choosing the cities for making comparisons, population data is drawn from the last census. While this data is easy to access and high quality, there are issues with using it. In the United States, census is undertaken every 10 years. Consequently, there are as many as 9 years discrepancy in the crime data obtained and the population at risk data. If the population is stable with insignificant growth, then this would not be a problem. However, in cities like Omaha, population grows at a significant rate thereby leading to overestimates of crime rates if the counts are for a later year than when the population was counted.

Ethical Considerations

The study uses data that does not identify the individuals booked for the criminal activities. Therefore, it upholds the ethical standards of keeping the participants of the study private and confidential. The data is used for display the trends in criminal rates with the intention of providing recommendations on how Omaha city can cultivate a safe environment for its residents and to attract investors. All the ethical standards for a research are maintained despite the sensitivity of the research topic.

Expected Outcomes – Analysis Significance

They study provides comparison among cities and over the years in presenting the performance of Omaha in crime ratings. It would help evaluates the performance of the police department in the city in preventing and controlling crime. It would also show how the control strategies that are implemented every year are assisting in changing the crime rates. Analyzing the trends over the five-year period would give an idea of whether the rates have been increasing or decreasing and which criminal activities have contributed to the changes. Comparing the rates with other cities of equal population size would help perceive those that are doing better than Omaha and therefore evaluate their crime mitigation strategies. This forms the basis for formulation of the recommendations for improvement in the city.

Data Analysis

Data is analyzed through calculation of the percentages to give the rates of increases in the five-year period for each city. The various types of crimes are also analyzed in their rates of change through calculation of percentages. Data is presented in tables and figures such as trend graphs, bar graphs, and pie charts.

Results

Collection and analysis of data is as presented in table 1 below.

Table 1: crime rates in Omaha and other four cities over a five-year period

City	Year	Robbery	Murder	Agg Assault	Rape	Auto Theft	Burglary	Theft	Total
Omaha City	2013	718	42	1505	184	3080	3509	12519	21,557
	2014	723	32	1523	180	3,146	2,997	12,990	21,591
Rate of Change	0.16 %	0.7 %	-23.8 %	1.2 %	-2.2 %	2.1 %	14.6 %	3.8 %
	2015	655	50	1558	174	2543	2160	11558	18,698
Rate of Change	-13.4 %	-9.4 %	56 %	2.3 %	-3.3 %	-19.2 %	-27.9	-11 %
	2016	610	29	1647	245	3125	2111	11571	19338
Rate of Change	3.42 %	-6.9 %	-42 %	5.7 %	40.8%	22.9 %	2.3 %	0.11 %
	2017	625	30	1843	410	3500	2088	11849	20345
Rate of Change	5.21 %	2.4 %	3.4 %	11.9 %	67.3 %	12 %	-1.1 %	2.4 %

City	Year	Robbery	Murder	Agg Assault	Rape	Auto Theft	Burglary	Theft	Total
Miami	2013	1826	88	3842	624	3236	7070	29097	45783
	2014	1807	82	4205	598	3098	6424	28702	44916
Rate of Change	-1.89 %	-1.04 %	– 6.82 %	9.45 %	-4.17 %	-4.26 %	– 9.14 %	-1.36
	2015	1627	85	4361	583	3190	5372	27969	43187
Rate of Change	-3.85 %	-9.96 %	3.66 %	3.71 %	-2.51 %	2.97 %	-16.38 %	-2.55 %
	2016	1505	86	4173	555	3250	2643	27862	50074
Rate of Change	15.95 %	7.5 %	1.18 %	-4.31 %	-4.8 %	1.88 %	– 50.8 %	-0.38 %
	2017	1386	93	3999	688	3457	4385	27000	41008
Rate of Change	-18.1 %	-7.91 %	8.14 %	-4.17 %	23.96 %	6.37 %	65.91 %	-3.09 %

City	Year	Robbery	Murder	Agg Assault	Rape	Auto Theft	Burglary	Theft	Total
Virginia Beach	2013	306	17	266	159	428	1388	9328	11892
	2014	256	17	278	149	345	1023	8368	10436
Rate of Change	-12.2 %	-16.34 %	0 %	4.51 %	-6.29 %	-19.4 %	-26.3 %	-10.3 %
	2015	269	19	236	147	402	926	8600	10699
Rate of Change	2.52 %	3.86 %	11.76 %	-15.11 %	-1.34 %	16.52 %	-9.48 %	2.77 %
	2016	264	22	286	167	457	827	8480	10503
Rate of Change	-1.83 %	-1.89 %	15.79 %	21.19 %	13.61 %	13.68 %	-10.69 %	1.4 %
	2017	284	15	249	140	427	725	7692	9532
Rate of Change	-9.24 %	7.58 %	-31.82 %	-12.94 %	-16.2 %	-6.56 %	-12.33 %	-9.32 %

City	Year	Robbery	Murder	Agg Assault	Rape	Auto Theft	Burglary	Theft	Total
Long Beach	2013	1117	33	1094	102	2004	2411	8669	15430
	2014	888	23	1248	110	1852	2175	8422	14718
Rate of Change	-4.61 %	-20.5 %	-30.3 %	14.08 %	7.84 %	-7.54 %	-9.75 %	-2.85 %
	2015	1055	36	1483	179	2025	1936	10406	17120
Rate of Change	16.32 %	18.81 %	56.52 %	18.83 %	62.73 %	9.34 %	-10.99 %	23.56 %
	2016	1138	33	1480	197	2028	1911	10355	17142
Rate of Change	0.13 %	7.87 %	-8.33 %	-0.2 %	10.06 %	0.15 %	-1.29 %	-0.49%
	2017	1237	22	1642	203	1587	1710	9387	15788
Rate of Change	-7.9 %	8.7 %	-33.33 %	10.95 %	3.05 %	-21.75 %	-10.52 %	-9.35 %

City	Year	Robbery	Murder	Agg Assault	Rape	Auto Theft	Burglary	Theft	Total
Colorado Springs	2013	426	31	1027	318	1882	3776	12769	20229
	2014	412	23	1184	311	1616	2747	11994	18287
Rate of Change	-9.6 %	-3.29 %	-25.81 %	15.29 %	-2.2 %	-14.13 %	-27.25 %	-6.07 %
	2015	377	29	1215	273	1680	2394	12438	18406
Rate of Change	0.65 %	-8.5 %	26.09 %	2.62 %	-12.2 %	3.96 %	-12.85 %	3.7 %
	2016	441	22	1373	287	2007	2546	11744	18420
Rate of Change	0.08 %	16.98 %	-24.14 %	13 %	5.13 %	19.46 %	6.35 %	-5.58 %
	2017	484	32	1435	270	2150	2481	10688	17540
Rate of Change	-4.78 %	9.75 %	45.45 %	4.52 %	-5.92 %	7.13 %	-2.55 %	-8.99 %

Analysis of the data indicates that crime rate has been on the increase since 2013 with the only year with a recorded decrease being 2015, when crime rate decreased by 13.4 percent. Murder crime rate has shown consistent decrease in the five years period.

All the cities compared with Omaha had better crime ratings with all of them recording decrease in crime in the course of the five-year period. In 2017, Virginia Beach recorded a drop of 9.24 percent, Long Beach recorded 7.9 percent decrease, Miami recorded 18.1 percent decrease, and Colorado Springs recorded 4.78 percent decrease. Only Omaha city recorded an increase in the crime rates with a 5.21 percent increase. However, a look at the crime accounts in all the cities indicate Miami to have the highest number of the counts. The city’s strategies in averting these numbers seem to be working in reducing the high numbers as there has been consistent decrease in the crime rates. It recorded the highest rate of decrease of decrease.

Conclusion

Omaha city is lagging behind in terms of crime control. Crime rates have been increasing over the last five years while cities of similar size have been containing crime to document a negative growth. Therefore the chief office in Omaha police department need to reassess crime control strategies and even borrow from those cities that are doing well in their mitigation strategies.

References

Greater Omaha Economic Development Council. (2009, February). Crime in Omaha.

FBI. (2015). Crime in the United States. Retrieved from https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s d.

Green, B., Horel, T., & Papachristos, A. V. (2017). Modeling contagion through social networks to explain and predict gunshot violence in Chicago, 2006 to 2014. JAMA internal medicine, 177(3), 326-333.

Hull, J. (1993, August). Time Magazine. Retrieved from http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,978960-3,00.html

Jones, R. W., & Pridemore, W. A. (2019). Toward an integrated multilevel theory of crime at place: Routine activities, social disorganization, and the law of crime concentration. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 35(3), 543-572.

Kershaw, C., & Tseloni, A. (2005). Predicting crime rates, fear and disorder based on area information: Evidence from the 2000 British Crime Survey. International Review of Victimology, 12(3), 293-311.

Larms.org. (2019). The Safest Cities in Nebraska 2019. Retrieved from https://www.alarms.org/safest-cities-in-nebraska/

Major Cities Chiefs Association. (2016). Violent Crime Survey- Totals, Midyear Comparison between 2016 and 2015 [Data file]. Retrieved from https://www.majorcitieschiefs.com/pdf/news/mcca_violent_crime_data_midyear_20162015.pdf.

OMAHA, N. C. I. (2007). A spatial Analysis of Neighborhood Crime in Omaha, Nebraska using alternative measures of crime rates.

Rosenfeld, R. (2016). Documenting and explaining the 2015 homicide rise: Research directions. National Institute of Justice at https://www. ncjrs. gov/pdffiles1/nij/249895. pdf.

Simon, T. (2016, September). Health Burden of Violence in United States. Presented at the Violence and Violence Prevention Congressional Briefing, Washington, D.C

Womack, S. (2012, January). No end to pain of 37 homicides. Omaha.com. Retrieved from https://archive.is/20130130195121/http://www.omaha.com/article/20120103/NEWS97/704189997/1009#selection-1781.0-1781.30

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