Cobourg Police Chief Kai Liu said the Maclean’s Canada’s Most Dangerous Places To Live, “is not reflective of the true reality.”
The article titled, “Canada’s Most Dangerous Places 2019″ was published on November 5, 2018 listing Cobourg as the 18th most dangerous place to live in Canada regarding their Crime Severity Index tool.
The link states it is for 2019, though it is still 2018.
The “2019” stats are actually for 2017 and the second McLean web link is labeled 2018 when in fact it is for 2016 Crime Severity Index statistics.
“At initial glance, the picture painted by using the Maclean’s 2019 Crime Severity Index tool, ‘five-year change in crime” is not reflective of the true reality that the town Cobourg continues to be amongst the safest places to live in Canada,” stated Liu.
“The principle behind the Crime Severity Index is to have more serious crimes carry a higher weight than less serious crimes. As a result, changes in more serious crimes would have a greater impact on the Index than on the traditional crime rate.”
Liu explains, when you have a relatively high Crime Severity Index in one given year, it is usually driven by increases in severe violent crimes, like homicide (at the top of the list) and assault for example.
“This does not equate to higher risk for the public.”
“There is an inherent fault when applying the Crime Severity Index as percentage change to a safe community such as Cobourg with a historically low Crime Severity Index and a relatively small population of just under 20,000.”
“With a small sample size, the inherent fault is that any slight change from the base number will cause a substantial mathematical increase in percentages.”
Liu illustrates this by the following example
• October 2017 Cobourg experienced its’ first homicide in over 10 years. This resulted in a 100% increase in our homicide rate.
• Having zero (0) aggravated assaults in 2016, Cobourg experienced two (2) incidents in 2017, a 200% increase
• In 2016 Cobourg had one (1) offensive weapons incident and in 2017 offensive weapons incidents increased to two (2), a 100% increase
“With these minimal numeric changes it is clear how misleading using percentages can skew reality.”
“It is important to recognize however small the number of incidents are, each incident resulted in a victim.”
“One victim of any crime is one victim too many,” states Liu.
In 2016 the Crime Severity Index ranked Cobourg 161/229 http://www.macleans.ca/canadas-most-dangerous-places/ and in 2017 in spite of the inherent statistical fault, Cobourg placed in the middle of the pack of safe communities ranked at 108/237 http://www.macleans.ca/canadas-most-dangerous-places-2019/?fbclid=IwAR0QSvfrp79ZTt7quNxd7eZZCFvFOHl3ykSoJbi1M_Oud3yBTnwxxgbh9xI).
Liu said it is a “statistical fallacy” to place Cobourg in 18th position using a “5 year change in crime.”
“Like a double edge sword, using the same Statistic Canada source, Cobourg Police Service criminal investigators can claim with pride of holding one of Canada’s highest violent weighted clearance rate of 86.5%. Source:http://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=3510018801&pickMembers%5B0%5D=1.62
“What the statistics actually show is the need for our continued efforts of changing the culture of our police service from one of reactive to proactive; by increasing our community based policing initiatives of having our officers more engaged with the community we serve.”
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
