What is journalism?

[2muchcoffeeman]

They cut their police department funding in 2020 and have had police staffing shortages. That data, which is produced by politicians, might be really misleading if it's more a matter of crime being underreported and/or not policed, than it is crime actually having decreased.

That has nothing to do with her tweet. I know little about Austin. But I also know to never trust crime statistics on their face. I'm not saying to believe the union rep either automatically, and they are in a contentious contract negotiation -- I'd rather some empirical evidence of what reality is -- but still. ...





'We are at our breaking point' | Austin Police ashociation highlights staffing issues at APD

City Council should be a special detail, like nightclubs, and the City Council should have to pay overtime rates to any officers that want to take care of them.

 

[The Big Ragu]

That lasted a year. Police budget higher than ever, just like each of the last couple years:

https://www.kvue.com/article/news/politics/austin-mayor-and-council/austin-city-council-2023-2024-fiscal-year-budget/269-6a58c7f1-a668-454b-861e-db9f11e5fe8b#:~:text=The General Fund budget is,increase for all civilian employees.

That "fact check" pointed to crime statistics in 2020, 2021 and 2022. What you linked to is budgeting that just went into effect in October, 2023 for the current fiscal year.

According to the union, the increases since that dramatic cut in 2020 (the City Council said they were cutting the police department's budget because of"community outcry against the disproportionate impact of police violence on Black Americans, Latinx Americans and other non-white ethnic communities") have been wholly inadequate to keep up with cost of policing. Also, a portion of that increase is for an oversight board that they put in place, not for actually policing. The union keeps saying they are severely understaffed and that response times are really bad. You can google the stories about 911 response times in Austin the last few years if you want.

Again, I don't know Austin. But I'm also not interested in just cherry picking whatever fits a narrative I WANT to be true. There is an objective truth about the crime situation in Austin, and I am just pointing this stuff out because I know that crime statistics are sometimes a local politician-created fiction.

 

[Regan MacNeil]

Just another libertarian asking questions!

 

[Songbird]

because I know that crime statistics are sometimes a local politician-created fiction

Cops are politicians too.

 

[The Big Ragu]

Cops are politicians too.

Yup. I never take anything cops say at face value. Especially when it is coming from a union rep. It doesn't mean that just because they say it is a lie, but it doesn't mean it's necessarily true either.

I also think crime isn't a straight function of how many police you have on the street, it usually way more correlates with how people are doing economically.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

That "fact check" pointed to crime statistics in 2020, 2021 and 2022. What you linked to is budgeting that just went into effect in October, 2023 for the current fiscal year.

According to the union, the increases since that dramatic cut in 2020 (the City Council said they were cutting the police department's budget because of"community outcry against the disproportionate impact of police violence on Black Americans, Latinx Americans and other non-white ethnic communities") have been wholly inadequate to keep up with cost of policing. Also, a portion of that increase is for an oversight board that they put in place, not for actually policing. The union keeps saying they are severely understaffed and that response times are really bad. You can google the stories about 911 response times in Austin the last few years if you want.

Again, I don't know Austin. But I'm also not interested in just cherry picking whatever fits a narrative I WANT to be true. There is an objective truth about the crime situation in Austin, and I am just pointing this stuff out because I know that crime statistics are sometimes a local politician-created fiction.

And the budgeting was at or close to record highs the two years prior.

 

[The Big Ragu]

And the budgeting was at or close to record highs the two years prior.

Nearly every year is a record high. Police budgets rarely get cut in cities with growing populations (just cost of living increases take care of that), and when they do get cut in a crisis, it is usually by a trace amount, never as dramatically as the cut they hit their department with in 2020.

That was why it got so much attention when they did that cut in 2020 amid the "defund the police" movement.

"Record highs" is meaingless press release language.

The operative question would be if they are budgeting adquately (whatever is adequate). According to the union, they are severely underfunded and understaffed with areas going unpatrolled, and 911 response times are bad.

If they are painting a truthful picture, it's at least possible that a significant amount of crime in Austin gets underreported or missed.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Which is why a 2020 reduction is not causing 2023-2024 issues.

 

[Alma]

coolcoolcool

So I went ahead and clicked on the two links, 2020 and 2023, the ones that should force Bari Weiss, if she were a real journalist, to delete her tweet.

Here's what the data says. In those links.

Murders: 47 in 2020, 67 in 2023
Kidnapping: 192 in 2020, 254 in 2023
Rape: 291 in 2020, 318 in 2023
Sexual ashault with object: 136 in 2020, 108 in 2023
Aggravated ashault: 3193 in 2020, 3440 in 2023
Simple ashault: 10,405 in 2020, 9357 in 2023
Intimidation: 5,969 in 2020, 4,629 in 2023
Total violations against peoples: 20,657 in 2020, 18,568 in 2023

Robbery has gone down since 2020. Arson has gone up. Car theft, down. Drug violations, up.

The decrease in "crimes against people" is accounted for in simple ashault and intimidation. But I think it's fair to say murder, rape, and aggravated ashault are the worst categories, and Austin has issues there.

And the murders in 2019 were 33. Austin murders went from 33 in 2019 - to 66 in 2022 and 67 in 2023.

The murders doubled in three years. They doubled.

That's a policy crisis any way you slice it.

 

[Azrael]

So I went ahead and clicked on the two links, 2020 and 2023, the ones that should force Bari Weiss, if she were a real journalist, to delete her tweet.

Here's what the data says. In those links.

Murders: 47 in 2020, 67 in 2023
Kidnapping: 192 in 2020, 254 in 2023
Rape: 291 in 2020, 318 in 2023
Sexual ashault with object: 136 in 2020, 108 in 2023
Aggravated ashault: 3193 in 2020, 3440 in 2023
Simple ashault: 10,405 in 2020, 9357 in 2023
Intimidation: 5,969 in 2020, 4,629 in 2023
Total violations against peoples: 20,657 in 2020, 18,568 in 2023

Robbery has gone down since 2020. Arson has gone up. Car theft, down. Drug violations, up.

The decrease in "crimes against people" is accounted for in simple ashault and intimidation. But I think it's fair to say murder, rape, and aggravated ashault are the worst categories, and Austin has issues there.

And the murders in 2019 were 33. Austin murders went from 33 in 2019 - to 66 in 2022 and 67 in 2023.

The murders doubled in three years. They doubled.

That's a policy crisis any way you slice it.

All attributable to that "progressive DA," no doubt.

Unless,

https://www.kvue.com/article/news/v...rify/269-19a528ef-08df-4b6d-b717-3dbb81fbbae0

D.A. Candidates Focus on Safety, Data Shows Austin Crime Rates Decreasing

https://www.kxan.com/news/crime/exploring-the-austin-police-departments-new-crime-data-dashboard/

there's something else going on

 

[Alma]

All attributable to that "progressive DA," no doubt.

Unless,

https://www.kvue.com/article/news/v...rify/269-19a528ef-08df-4b6d-b717-3dbb81fbbae0

D.A. Candidates Focus on Safety, Data Shows Austin Crime Rates Decreasing

https://www.kxan.com/news/crime/exploring-the-austin-police-departments-new-crime-data-dashboard/

there's something else going on

While you're not necessarily changing Bari Weiss' subject, you are changing mine, in a sense.

The tweet you shared was of the "never happened" variety. Except something did happen. Murders doubled in 4 years. That's bad. And the numbers that went down are susceptible to the defounding and unfounding tactics that any police department/DA have at their disposal. The idea that murders and intimidation are in the same "crimes against people" category, as defined by the police department is kind of comical. Murder is murder, and murders doubled in four years. There's no "yeah, but" to that. A doubling of murders is a spectacular failure. (Note: Austin had 89 murders in 2021!)

Whether Weiss' outfit has a correct opinion or not - the FP story cited FBI stats as of October 2023, comparing Austin to the rest of the state and the nation - is another question. But the story is pretty clearly an advocacy piece, citing some facts - perhaps cherry picked - and deploying some opinion.

Weiss' outfit is welcome to do that. Everyone else does it. Twitter does it. Not great journalism. But this case is far from the most egregious thing I've seen.

 

[Azrael]

The tweet I posted was Weiss calling out a progressive DA for a "soaring" increase in crime.

The Nocera piece doesn't really demonstrate cause and effect - or a progressive DA - as the root of the increase in crime.

I'm not refuting your post, because this is a thread about journalism and Bari Weiss is a very good example of a very bad trend.

And as to "yeah but," maybe Texas gun law has as much to do with it as anything.