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Police Operations and Data Analysis Report, Morgan Hill, California
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The spatial distribution of workload and crime lends itself nicely to the development of strategic
and operational plans. For example, the top four locations in each one of the figures above are retail
stores: Walmart, Safeway, and Target. These locations generate 37.8 percent of all the CFS recorded
in the identified hot spots and 37.8 percent of all the crime CFS recorded. These locations are the
hottest of the hot and the biggest contributors to workload in the community. They also lend
themselves to specific and targeted operational plans to address the high workload. Working with
the stores themselves, the MHPD should develop and implement an operational plan directed at
these locations. This plan would be comprehensive and involve patrol, detectives, and traffic
personnel and seek to reduce both the call volume and the crime.
While the specific elements of this plan are beyond the scope of this report, the MHPD can embrace
the same process used to create its strategic plan for these specific locations. The plan should
address offenses with a high frequency of occurrence, such as shoplifting, burglary, and theft from
motor vehicles. Public education campaigns encouraging locking of vehicles and basic security
measures can assist in reducing the number of offenses in these areas. Partnerships with store
owners and the local Chamber of Commerce can facilitate strategies to reduce incidents of
shoplifting and the related drain on police resources.
Recommendation:
Address “hot spots” in the community by leveraging all operational assets of the
department.
Traffic Division
The mission of the Traffic Division is to promote traffic safety in the city of Morgan Hill. The section
relies primarily on enforcement to accomplish this mission.
The section is made up of one corporal and one police officer. The personnel assigned work from
7:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday, and also have the authority to “flex” their working
schedule to address conditions in the community.
The division focuses its enforcement efforts on accident-prone locations and on traffic complaints
received from the community. In addition to traffic enforcement, division personnel have a wide
array of administrative responsibilities, both traffic and nontraffic related.
The division is responsible for coordinating the “rotation” tow program, responding to traffic
complaints made by the community, processing any on-line traffic complaints, conducting
enforcement and high visibility patrols in school zones and accident prone locations, preparing
traffic grant applications, deploying “metro count” meters in response to community complaints,
managing the Traffic Safe Communities program, deploying the radar trailer, and publishing a
quarterly traffic newsletter. In addition to these duties, the Traffic Division administers “CopLink,”
manages the E-Citation hardware and software, and acts as the MHPD armorer and Taser
instructor. Division personnel also manage the AVASA program with the VIPs and MSOs and the city
website administrator. The administrative burden on this division is substantial.