Ammar Elamir
Crime Severity Index
The Halton Regional Police Service (HRPS) is pleased to announce that Halton Region has maintained its position of having the lowest Crime Severity Index of all Canadian municipalities with a population of 100,000 or more for the 14th straight year, according to Statistics Canada's annual report on crime in Canada.
The report, entitled, "Police-reported crime statistics in Canada, 2018", provides a detailed overview of crime statistics as reported by police services across the country.
Halton's Crime Severity Index data for 2018:
- Has maintained its position of having the lowest Crime Severity Index* of all Canadian municipalities with a population of 100,000 or more for the 14th straight year;
- Had the lowest Crime Severity Index (CSI) when compared to Ontario's 'Big 12' police services;
- Had the lowest Violent Crime Severity Index when compared to Ontario's 'Big 12' police services;
- Had the lowest Non-Violent Crime Severity Index when compared to Ontario's 'Big 12' police services;
- Maintained the lowest values for each of these three indices for 11 straight reporting years (2008 - 2018) when compared to Ontario's 'Big 12' police services;
- Had the lowest overall crime rate, violent crime rate, and property crime rate amongst Ontario's 'Big 12' police services; and
- Had the highest Weighted Clearance Rate* (55.6 per cent) of the same 'Big 12' and has maintained the lowest value for this index for five straight years (2014 – 2018).
Each year, Statistics Canada reports on the number and type of criminal incidents coming to the attention of police. To facilitate comparisons among geographic areas as well as over time, police-reported crime has traditionally been expressed as a rate per 100,000 population.
The traditional "crime rate" provides information on the number of police-reported incidents that have occurred for a given population, but does not provide information on the overall seriousness of crimes reported by police. For this reason, the Crime Severity Index (CSI) was developed.
The Crime Severity Index enables Canadians to track changes in the severity of police-reported crime from year to year. It does so by taking into account not only the change in volume of a particular crime, but also the relative seriousness of that crime in comparison to other crimes.
The CSI helps answer such questions as: is the crime coming to the attention of police more or less serious than before; and, is police-reported crime in a given city or province more or less serious than in Canada overall?
The Weighted Clearance Rate is the proportion of reported crimes solved by police, factoring in the seriousness of individual offences. Weighted clearance rate is based on the same principles as the Police Reported Crime Severity Index (CSI), whereby more serious offences are assigned a higher 'weight' than less serious offences. For example, the clearing of homicides, robberies or break and enters would represent a greater contribution to the overall weighted clearance rate value than the clearing of minor theft, mischief or disturbing the peace.
