National Crime Statistics Exchange (NCS-X) Implementation Assistance Program: Phase 1 Support for State Program

The National Crime Statistics Exchange (NCS-X) is an effort to expand the FBI’s National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) into a nationally representative system of incident-based crime statistics. BJS and the FBI are implementing NCS-X with the support of other Department of Justice agencies, including the Office for Victims of Crime. At the outset of the project, the FBI and BJS signed a joint statement of support for NCS-X (http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/NCS-X_FBI_BJS%20Joint_Statement.pdf). The goal of NCS-X is to enroll a sample of 400 scientifically selected law enforcement agencies to submit data to NIBRS; when these 400 new NIBRS-reporting agencies are combined with the more than 6,300 agencies that reported to NIBRS as of 2013, the nation will have a nationally representative system of incident-based crime statistics drawn from the operational data systems of local police departments. These incident-based data will draw upon the attributes and circumstances of criminal incidents and allow for more detailed and transparent descriptions of crime in communities. The sample-based approach to enrolling new NIBRS reporting agencies will allow the production of national estimates of crime based on incident-based data, while NIBRS moves gradually to becoming the system to which all law enforcement agencies in the United States submit their UCR data. The sample of 400 agencies has been drawn, including a subset of additional agencies held in reserve to replace agencies that may decline to participate and to accommodate other needs for replacement. The list of sample and reserve agencies is available on the BJS website at http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/NCSX_sampled_agencies.pdf.