For years, the state police have put out an annual Uniform Crime Report that provides an incomplete picture of criminal activity in Pennsylvania.
The report is a monumental waste of taxpayer's money and of little use to the public and policy-makers.
If anything, it underreports the incidence of crime and, therefore, doesn't give the public a good measure of whether their communities are safe from crime or not.
The report is based on statistics supplied by local police departments, yet currently just half of the 1,204 local police departments in Pennsylvania fully disclose data.
This glaring omission hasn't stopped bureaucrats from churning out the report year after year anyway. After all, its release is mandated under a 1971 state law. The report generates headlines for a day or two and then fades away until the next year.
Now state lawmakers have passed legislation to address the UCR's shortcomings.
Gov. Ed Rendell should sign the bill, which gives the state police more tools to ensure that the report is complete, accurate and reflects the participation of local police departments.
The state police would be required to issue a formal notification to departments that don't file. If a department still fails to comply, it could lose its share of revenues from state funds and fines and grant money.
The bill sponsor, Sen. Jay Costa, D-Allegheny, said efforts will be made to provide more state assistance to help police departments that are thinly staffed do their work.
It sounds like a commonsense approach. Why didn't anybody think of this back in 1971?
-- (AP) The (Sunbury) Daily Item
