Interactive crime mapping tool beneficial for police, residents

POTTSTOWN — Mapping crime in Pottstown moved in the digital direction after Police Chief Richard Drumheller took over the department in the spring.
Now, instead of using thumbtacks and a paper map, the Pottstown Police Department is using www.crimemapping.com, to track crime and analyze trends in the borough.
The department pays for the services analysis and data but the interactive website can be viewed for free by the public.
“Quite frankly it provides a lot of information if you go on and look at it. It tells you what the date was, what the location was, what the crime was, what the time was and what the control number is,” Drumheller said about the information provided by the website.
When police officers write reports, the basic information is extracted by crimemapping.com and plotted on the virtual borough map.
The online tool is not just useful for the public, Drumheller said. The department started using the analysis they receive through their subscription to direct patrols to areas of town where they are needed.
Not only that, Drumheller said the website saved the department time.
“Believe it or not years ago - well not years ago, months ago - we used to data point (the crimes) and based on the information we had available we would make our own maps and plot the data,” Drumheller said.
He said crimemapping.com is also less labor intensive.
“It gives you a better visual clue of what is going on in the borough,” Drumheller said.
Crimes from homicide to driving under the influence and disturbing the peace are mapped. Each crime was assigned a colorful symbol by the website which makes finding particular crimes easy.
Not only are the crimes assigned symbols, but the free data can be broken down by date range, mile radius for specific points, and crime type.
Drumheller hopes the newly accessible information will pique the publics interest and spur a discussion with residents and police. He said investigations often benefit when residents help police.
“We don’t want to hide where crime happens in Pottstown. We want to let it be known,” Drumheller said. “We have crime like every other community and we share ours through the internet. We have no mysteries. We have no secrets, here it is.”