Campussupportingstatement A

SUPPORTING STATEMENT

A. Justification

1. Necessity of Information Collection

The proposed Survey of Campus Law Enforcement Agencies will be the only systematic, national-level data collection providing information about campus law enforcement personnel, budgets, equipment, and policies and procedures. The survey will be the most comprehensive source of national statistics about law enforcement agency operations at universities and college in the U.S. There is no other source for these important statistics.

The importance of collecting these statistics is manifested by the fact that the U.S. Congress has mandated in the Crime Awareness and Campus Security Act of 1990 (now known as the Clery Act) that every campus in the U.S. must provide annual crime reports to the Department of Education as well as to faculty, staff, and students (both current and prospective). The data to be collected in this survey will effectively supplement the Clery Act statistics, by providing data on the characteristics of the law enforcement agency serving each campus.

Based on currently budgeted funds, BJS plans to collect data from up to 1,600 agencies across the country. This will include all 4-year university and college campuses with 2,500 or more students and a sample of 4-year campuses enrolling fewer than 2,500 students. All 2-year colleges with 10,000 or more students and a sample of 2-year colleges with smaller enrollments will also be included. Previously data about campus law enforcement agencies has been collected as part of the Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) survey, and the Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies.

Selected findings from the 2004-05 school year survey include:

• Three-fourths of campus law enforcement agencies serving 4-year universities and colleges with 2,500 or more students employed sworn law enforcement officers

• Nearly all public campuses (93%) used sworn officers compared to less than half of private campuses (42%)

• Entry-level sworn police officers earned an average starting salary of $30,600, about 6% less than their counterparts in local police departments

• A sixth of campus law enforcement agencies required new officers to have a 2-year or 4-year college degree, compared 1 in 10 local police departments

• Agencies required an average of more than 800 hours of training for new officers, ranging from 400 hours at small private colleges to 1,100 hours at large public universities

• About 1 in 4 campus law enforcement agencies used in-field computers

• About two-thirds of campus law enforcement agencies had a written terrorism response plan

• Nearly all students at 4-year schools with 2,500 or more students had access to crime prevention programs provided by campus law enforcement personnel

The statutory mandate to collect these data is derived from Title 42 U.S.C. Section 3732 (Attachment 1), in which the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) is directed to collect and analyze statistical information regarding the operation of the criminal justice system at the Federal, state, and local levels.

2. Uses of Information

The data to be collected by the Survey of Campus Law Enforcement Agencies will be used to provide national-level measures estimates of law enforcement personnel, budgets, equipment, and policies and procedures. These statistics are requested and used by police chiefs, security directors, education administrators, legislators, planners, researchers, and others to identify resource needs, trends, and priorities in campus law enforcement.

Campus police chiefs and security administrators will use the information to conduct benchmark comparisons to assess, relative to other agencies, their staffing levels, diversity of officers, agency functions, types of officers and patrol coverage provided, operating budget, officer pay and benefits, education and training requirements for officers, types of equipment used, computers and information systems, campus emergency communication systems, mass notification systems, special programs, community policing activities, preparedness activities, and clearance rates for serious crimes.

The importance of campus safety is made evident by the Congressionally-mandated reporting of crime on campus required of all U.S. post-secondary institutions receiving federal funding. The data collected by the Survey of Campus Law Enforcement Agencies will provide valuable information to administrators, researchers, and policy makers, for the study of the covariates of campus crime both in terms of general campus characteristics and the characteristics of campus law enforcement agencies. Such information will be useful to campus officials in developing programs that serve to reduce the incidence of crime on campus.

3. Efforts to Minimize Burden

For smaller campuses, (4-year campuses with fewer than 2,500 students and 2-year campuses with fewer than 10,000 students) sampling will be used. The exact sample design will be determined in consultation with the data collection agent chosen by BJS as a result of the currently advertised request for proposals. One purpose of the sample survey is to reduce the respondent burden. This will address the fact that in lower enrollment categories the number of campuses in the universe increases considerably compared to the largest enrollment categories. To further reduce respondent burden, the data collection methodology also includes Along-form@ and Ashort-form@ variations of the data collection instrument. Self-representing large campus agencies will receive the 8-page long-form (CJ-42L). The smaller sampled agencies will receive the shorter 4-page short-form (CJ-42S). BJS will also offer a web-based response option as part of this data collection, and encourage respondents to use this options, based on the results of the just completed data collection for 2008 Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies, BJS estimates that up to 60% of respondents will use this electronic option. To maximize the response rate, BJS will provide options for respondents to submit their data by mail or fax, if the web option is not suitable for them. Personal telephone interviews will be conducted for non-respondents.

BJS has also attempted to minimize the complexity of questions and ensured that terminology conforms to current standard practices in law enforcement. Data collection is estimated to take three hours per long-form respondent and 90 minutes per short-form respondent.

4. Efforts to Identify Duplication

There will be no duplication of effort based on the nature and scope of this survey, and the information sought is not attainable from any other data source. The only other related national data collection is the crime statistics collection mandated by the Clery Act. That collection, managed by the Department of Education, will not be duplicated in any way by this survey.

5. Minimizing Burden on Small Businesses

Not applicable. No information will be gathered from small businesses.

6. Consequences of Not Conducting Collection

This data collection will be the only source of national data on law enforcement personnel, budgets, equipment, and policies and procedures. There are no other sources for these data.

7. Special circumstances that would increase respondent burden

There are no special circumstances that would require a respondent to report more than once, report in less than 30 days, retain records over three years, or in any other foreseeable way increase the respondent’s burden to provide the requested information.

8. Public Comments and Consultations

No comments regarding this survey were received during the required 60-day and 30-day public comment periods. BJS has consulted with staff of the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators (IACLEA), and various members of the campus law enforcement community, regarding the questionnaire content, and the clarity of instructions. Focus groups were held in Washington in February 2009 and in Atlantic City in April 2009. In addition, an ongoing email discussion with members of the IACLEA Survey Review Committee has been beneficial as well. Consultants who have advised BJS thus far include the following:

1. Chris Blake, Associate Director, International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, (P) 860.586.7517, [email protected];

2. Max L. Bromley, Associate Professor of Criminology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, (P) 813-974-7281 [email protected];

3. Howard M. Cook, Chief of Police, Columbia College Police Department, Columbia, SC (P) 803-786-3001, [email protected];

4. Julee Cope, Chief of Safety & Security Department, Owens Community College, Toledo, Ohio (P) 567-661-7575, [email protected];

5. John Kleberg, Assistant Vice President for Administration (retired), Ohio State University, (P) 614-746-4184, [email protected];

6. Joe Monroe, Interim Chief of Police, University of Kentucky Police Department, Lexington, Kentucky (P) 859-257-5770 x 241, [email protected];

7. James Overton, Chief of Police, Delaware State University Public Safety, Dover, Delaware (P) 320-857-7473, [email protected];

8. Vickie L. Weaver, Director of Public Safety, Rider University, Lawrenceville, NJ (P) 609-896-5049, [email protected];

9. David Bergeron, Director, Policy and Budget Development, Office of Post-Secondary Education, U.S. Department of Education, (P) 202-502-7950, [email protected].

9. Provision of Payments or Gifts to Respondents

Not applicable. The Bureau will not provide any payment or gift of any type to respondents. Respondents participate in the survey on a voluntary basis.

10. Assurance of Confidentiality

Respondents will be informed that survey participation is voluntary. The data collected are in the public domain and not subject to confidentiality guarantees. All data, except names of individual respondents, will be made available for public use.

11. Justification for Sensitive Questions

There are no questions of a sensitive nature included in the data collection.

12. Estimate of Respondent Burden

The long-form (CJ-42L) will be sent to approximately 850 law enforcement agencies serving larger campuses, and the short form (CJ-42S) will be sent to a sample of approximately 750 agencies serving smaller campuses (see Section B - Statistical Methods, below, for greater detail). The average time required for each long-form agency is 3 hours, and for short-form agencies, 1 ½ hours. These estimates are based on experience garnered from previous administrations of similar BJS surveys as well as consideration of the currently proposed instrument. These estimates will be revised as needed based on pretest results. The total respondent burden is estimated at 3,675 hours. Respondents will be asked to respond once.

Reporting method	Type of respondent	Number of respondents	Number of responses	Average reporting time	Total burden hours
Long form - Web, fax, or mail	Larger campuses	850	850	3 hours	2,550
Short form Web, fax, or mail	Smaller campuses	750	750	1.5 hours	1,125
TOTAL	All campuses	1,600	1,600	2.29 hours	3,675

The survey form, in most cases, will be filled out by one person per respondent, equivalent to the GS-15 / 01 level ($98,156 per year). The cost to the respondent would be about $142 per long-form, and $71 per short-form. For all respondents combined, the approximate cost would be $181,000.

13. Estimate of Respondents= Cost Burden

This information collection will require only information that is already generated and maintained by the respondents. There is no additional cost to respondents other than the cost of filling out the survey form.

14. Cost to Federal Government

The total cost to the Federal government for this survey is estimated at $469,006, all to be borne by the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Office costs are based on 12 months work at 1/3 time of a GS-14 / 09 Statistician salary ($130,118 per year) and benefits (33 percent of salary) and indirect costs (20% of salary) of the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Summary of Cost Estimates

Office Costs (BJS)

Salaries $43,373

Benefits (33%) 14,458

Travel 2,000

Equipment and supplies 500

Other costs 0

Indirect costs (20%) 8,675

Subtotal 69,006

Collection costs (grantee) 400,000

Total cost to government $469,006

15. Reasons for Change in Burden

No change.

16. Publication Plans and Schedule

Information collected from campus law enforcement agencies will be reported in a Bureau of Justice Statistics bulletin. The data will then be made available to the public through the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD), operated by the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR).

The projected schedule for data collection, publication and data release is as follows:

Preparation and pretesting Months 1 - 3

Data collection Months 3 - 9

Data processing/analysis Months 8 - 10

Publication release Month 12

Data release to public Month 13

17. Display of Expiration Date

The expiration date will be shown on the survey form.

18. Exceptions to the Certification Statement

There are no exceptions identified in Item 19, ACertification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions,@ of OMB Form 83-I.