A new online tool that allows members of the public to monitor crime in their neighborhoods is now available for Madison, though the information has some limitations.

Madison is only the second city in the state and one of about 400 in the nation to use www.crimereports.com to report its crime information online.

The crime-mapping tool has been on the police wish list for years but became a reality after the 2007 neighborhood listening sessions, which revealed widespread concern about quality-of-life crimes such as theft, vandalism and noise.

The sessions prompted the Police Department to better organize its crime data and hire three more data analysts — which also made reporting on the Internet possible, Madison Police Capt. Carl Gloede said.

"We heard it clear that there's a need to be more receptive and provide more timely information to the public on crime issues," Gloede said.

The Web site allows anyone to type in an address and receive free e-mail alerts when police report crimes within the vicinity. The information on the Web site is updated daily at 3 a.m.

Not included are traffic citations and crashes because they would have cluttered the map, Gloede said. All other major and minor crimes are mapped, Gloede said.

"We're not trying to hide anything," Gloede said.

Users can select which types of crimes to track — from homicides to noise complaints. They also can adjust the reporting distance from a specific address, search by police sector or aldermanic ward, or search within a range of dates going back six months. The site also tracks the location of registered sex offenders.

The Web site combines Google's online mapping program with information automatically provided daily by the Madison Police Department. The city pays $130 a month to feed information from its police records management system to a Utah-based Internet company, Public Engines.

The amount of detail posted is up to the individual police agency. Some agencies include a short narrative description of the crime, though Madison police do not. Agencies can also allow the public to track information further back than six months, but the Madison Police Department has not elected to do so. Gloede said the system will be tweaked as the department begins to receive feedback.

Each Madison crime incident reported on the Web site includes the street block, date, time, type of crime and case number. Anyone who wants more information can file a records request for the police report, Gloede said.

Last year the Police Department spent a significant amount of time correcting data errors in its records system. Gloede said the city has about 160,000 valid addresses, but because the same address was being entered in different ways, the system had more than 2 million variations.

Prior to 2008, not all Madison police activities were being assigned case numbers. Traffic tickets and general neighborhood beat coverage, for example, weren't recorded. A staffing study conducted last year concluded Madison needed the data to set staffing priorities.

Most of that has been fixed, Gloede said, allowing the data analysts to track crime patterns and adjust police resources.

"It's a chess game," Gloede said. "To effectively move your pieces, you need a game plan."

For example, the data will allow police to track when they are busiest and what conditions and times create the extra work.

The data also could help neighborhoods take a proactive approach to crime. Melanie Hampton, a Dane County Board member and Madison police officer, said that when she tried out the mapping Web site, she was surprised by the number of burglaries in her area.

"A lot of my constituents have been interested in this kind of data and really expect it to be available," Hampton said. "People have been surprised that it hasn't been available until now.

Michael Scott, a University of Wisconsin-Madison law professor who specializes in law enforcement, said he has encouraged Madison police for years to follow the lead of other police agencies around the country and post their crime data online.

"The data can have a reassuring effect by showing citizens that their neighborhoods are not necessarily as crime-ridden as they might otherwise believe," Scott said. "Other times, the data are helpful in informing citizens that there is a crime problem in their neighborhood which might motivate them and police to take steps to address."

"Whichever way it cuts, official crime data should only be the beginning of a discussion among citizens, police, and other officials about neighborhood safety— to figure out what the numbers mean, how serious the problems are, what is causing the problems, and how they can be addressed," Scott added. "The raw numbers alone do not speak for themselves."