Maricopa’s Top Cop Takes New Approach to Crime Report

Published on May 18, 2023

A police officer stands at a podium speaking in a conference room. Behind him are seated attendees, including a man in a suit. The mood is formal.

This week Maricopa Police Chief Mark Goodman gave an inside look at the Maricopa Police Department’s crime report for 2022. Instead of focusing on the ebbs and flows of hard crime statistics that can at times obscure the true impact of officers, Chief Goodman sought to address a bigger question; “Where are our police officers spending their time, and what does that look like in terms of keeping Maricopa one of the safest cities in Arizona?”

To answer those questions, Chief Goodman broke down the calls for service received by the department and addressed a key priority for Mayor Nancy Smith and City Council - traffic.

“Crime data, when looked at face value, can be misleading,” Chief Goodman explained. “If we only had one incident in a certain category the year prior and one additional one this year that looks like a 100% increase yet there are only two incidents in total. It’s more important to understand the trends and what help the community is asking for.”

He adds that by taking a critical look at calls for service we can see where the needs of the community are and decide if the department is positioning officers to be ready for the calls in terms of patrol routes and even the training they receive.

Looking at the Call Data

In 2022, the Maricopa Police Department dispatch received 36,574 calls for service. Seventeen percent of those calls resulted in a written report by an officer.

The top three categories for service were; self-initiated calls, which are generated by officers who see something and initiate checking into it, suspicious activity reported by residents, and welfare checks.

“This tells us that we not only have an engaged police department, but we also have an engaged community that says something when they see something out of the ordinary,” Chief Goodman says. “This is vital to community policing.”

Looking deeper into the calls for service, he explains only 1% of calls were classed as “Priority H” - the highest level of priority in Maricopa. That can include any life-threatening call where the life or safety of a person is threatened. More importantly, close to 75% of all the calls received by the Maricopa Police Department were considered “Priority 3” calls. That category of call includes nuisance calls, civil standbys, and any incident that could be classified as a delayed report - meaning the incident is no longer happening.

“Priority 3 calls represent opportunities in my opinion,” Chief Goodman says. “They are the types of calls where we get to interact with the community, build relationships all while providing a high level of service to our residents.”

Pie chart showing calls by priority for a dispatch service: Priority 1 (73%) is largest, followed by Priority 2 (22%), with smaller slices for others. Text details priority levels.

The department has also been able to expand its specialty units in order to meet the demands of the city, especially when it comes to growth and more cars on the road.

Taking Fast Action to Slow Down Speeders

Busy intersections and unfocused drivers are not a good combination. They often lead to traffic collisions, property damage, and even injuries to residents. In 2022, MPD dispatch received 606 calls regarding traffic collisions, a number Chief Goodman says he’s focused on bringing down.

MPD expanded the Traffic Unit from 2 officers in 2022 to 4 officers currently on the streets now in 2023. They are tasked with enforcing traffic laws, monitoring speeds, responding to traffic collisions, DUI enforcement, and more. They issued 35% of all citations written by the department in 2022.

“Speeding is our number one driving behavior that causes the most crashes and it also causes the most injuries,” Chief Goodman says. “That is why slowing down speeders is a top priority for traffic enforcement moving forward.”

The unit has been at the forefront of identifying traffic hotspots around the city where speeding and traffic collisions are most likely to occur. This data is then used to inform targeted enforcement details and/or work with City of Maricopa developers to update roadways to allow for better traffic flow.

Looking ahead, Chief Goodman says he wants to keep taking a critical look at the trends happening in our city to make the right decisions at the right time. That includes continuing to expand the traffic unit as Maricopa grows, using data to drive enforcement locations, and working with the school district to update school traffic plans.