Is the Shift to NIBRS Slowing Down Public Access to Crime Data?

In recent years, the transition from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) system to the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) has been hailed as a major upgrade in crime data collection. NIBRS offers more granular, detailed reporting compared to UCR’s summary-based approach. But while the benefits sound promising on paper, in practice we’re seeing a troubling side effect: timely, block level incident crime data is slowing down—or disappearing entirely—from public view and access.

Is NIBRS to Blame?

The NIBRS transition is not the only factor, but it's a significant one. Unlike UCR, which focused on counting major offenses, NIBRS demands more detail and structure. That means departments must invest in costly software upgrades, retrain staff, and restructure internal workflows. These changes introduce delays—and in some cases, departments decide it's easier to stop releasing data altogether rather than deal with the complexity.

Adding to the issue is that many of the RMS vendors hired to help departments make the switch to NIBRS don’t prioritize open data. If a department doesn't explicitly require public access in their contract, vendors often leave it out.

Departments are struggling to make their new systems compatible with NIBRS while maintaining public access. Some have simply stopped updating their crime feeds entirely. The shift has exposed how reliant police departments are on third-party vendors to manage their internal Records Management Systems (RMS).

Los Angeles: LAPD Data Feed Goes Dark

The LAPD recently stopped updating its public crime data feed altogether, citing complications with its new NIBRS-compliant RMS. According to SpotCrime’s recent blog post, the last public crime data update was from 2023. While NIBRS is intended to improve data quality and accuracy, the transition has had the opposite effect for public transparency.

The LAPD now only releases data through quarterly, summary-level reports. Not only is this a massive step backward for real-time transparency, but it also prevents journalists, researchers, and the public from accessing granular, street-level crime information that used to be readily available.

Baton Rouge: Sharp Drop in Daily Crime Incidents

Since August 2024, the number of daily crime incidents shared by the Baton Rouge Police Department through their open data portal has dropped drastically—from 40–60 incidents per day to as few as 3. A review of the data feed revealed that entire categories of crime (like certain thefts or assaults) were no longer appearing in the public dataset, despite showing up in internal dashboards like the city’s calls for service platform.

The culprit? A new records management system (RMS) provided by Axon. While the system was designed to replicate the data structure of the old platform, something got lost in translation. Months passed before the issue was even acknowledged as a data misalignment between the vendor, the police department, and the city's open data team. It's still unclear whether the fix will restore full transparency.

Vendor Lock-In and Private Equity Control

The private equity boom in public safety tech is making things worse. A detailed report from PoliceRecordsManagement.com outlines how many RMS and CAD companies have been bought up and consolidated by private equity firms. These firms often focus on profitability, not public service. As a result, innovation slows, costs rise, and data access becomes more restricted.

One stark finding from their 2025 survey: fewer than 20% of agencies surveyed said their RMS makes it “easy” to share data with the public. That’s a huge problem in an era where public trust in policing depends on transparency.

Why This Matters

Timely, open crime data is critical for public safety, accountability, and trust. When public feeds dry up, it becomes harder for residents to stay informed about crime in their neighborhoods, harder for watchdogs to track trends or identify issues, and easier for institutions to control the narrative.

The shift to NIBRS was supposed to modernize crime reporting. Instead, we’re seeing cities go dark, public dashboards shrink, and feeds vanish. If we don’t address the systemic issues behind this, the promise of NIBRS may turn into a transparency crisis.

What Can Be Done?

• Mandate open data requirements in contracts with RMS vendors.
• Include public data access as a core feature in NIBRS transition plans.
• Maintain legacy data feeds or parallel reporting systems during the transition.
• Engage the public and watchdog groups to flag problems early and often.

The tools for transparency exist—it’s just a matter of making them a priority.