Urbana Police Survey

A survey about the police for Urbana residents includes some enticements to participate. From the News-Gazette Monday:

Urbana begins study of public opinion of community policing
Investigators working on a study about community policing strategies are hoping that Urbana residents asked to answer questions will take the time to respond.

"We sent out 1,500 letters to people to take a survey to figure out how they feel about police and neighborhood safety," said Melissa Haynes, who works as a crime analyst for the Urbana Police Department.

Although the goal of the research is to improve police-community relationships, the research is being done by investigators independent of the police department.

Mike Schlosser, director of the University of Illinois Police Training Institute is one of the study's four principal investigators. Others involved are Haynes and researchers from the UI's department of anthropology, law school and business college.

Haynes calls it a "super-cool multi-disciplinary mixed study" that combines researchers from a number of backgrounds such as number crunchers like herself with survey experts and anthropologists who are skilled at interviews and focus groups.

A National Institute of Justice grant is paying for the research.

To get the attention of the letter recipients, researchers included a dollar bill. Another post card will follow, and at the end of this month, workers from the UI will knock on doors in the selected neighborhoods to personally encourage residents to call in and take the survey.

More at the full article here. There was also a brief overview from WCCU (video segment available here from WCCU and also here from WAND - [UPDATE from WAND here.]):

The Urbana community's relationship with police is the focus of a new study and investigators are asking for citizens' help.

The research project, led by the University of Illinois , sent a letter to 1,500 Urbana residences asking them to participate in a confidential telephone interview.

Dr. Michael Schlosser, one of the investigators and director of the Univerity of Illinois Police Training Institute, said "the purpose of the study is to look at how police strategies affect community perceptions and experiences with the Urbana police."

Schlosser said the interview takes about 20 minutes, and all participants will receive a $10 Walmart gift card for their time.

If you didn't receive the letter, but are still interested in speaking with researchers, you can email the research team at UCPRStudy@illinous.edu.