On the meaning and measurement of output and efficiency in the provision of urban police services

Most proposals for changing the organization of police serving metropolitan areas are presented without any evidence concerning the effectiveness of differently organized police departments in serving urban areas. Assertions are simply made that large scale police departments are more effective and more efficient. This paper attempts first to define the concepts of output and efficiency for police agencies. Secondly, it attempts to develop some potential measures of output and efficiency which could be used in evaluating the comparative output and efficiency of differently organized police departments serving metropolitan areas. A simplified scheme is presented which divides police activities into four types and discusses the problems of measurement for each type. The problems of measuring output and efficiency become more and more difficult as one moves from the first through the fourth type of police activity. While extensive difficulties are present in any attempt to measure the output and efficiency of police agencies, such efforts must be undertaken in order to evaluate the success of past reforms and to be able to predict future successes or failures with higher degrees of accuracy. Without serious attempts to evaluate the consequences of reform, future changes may produce more harm than good.