{"$schema":"https://spotcrime.io/methodology.schema.json","version":"1.0.0","canonical":"https://spotcrime.io/methodology","publisher":{"name":"SpotCrime","url":"https://spotcrime.io","apiDocs":"https://spotcrime.io/api/docs","contact":"feedback@spotcrime.com"},"scores":{"crimeGrade":{"id":"crime-grade-decile-v1","name":"SpotCrime Crime Grade (decile method)","summary":"A city's violent crime rate per 100,000 residents is ranked against a fixed comparison population of FBI-reporting cities and bucketed into deciles 1–10, then mapped to a letter grade A–F. Lower decile = safer. No proprietary weighting, no black box.","metric":{"name":"Violent crime rate per 100,000 residents","definition":"Murder + rape + robbery + aggravated assault, summed, divided by the agency's covered population, multiplied by 100,000.","offensesIncluded":["murder","rape","robbery","aggravated assault"],"unit":"incidents per 100,000 residents per year","window":"Most recent fully-reported calendar year"},"source":{"name":"FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) via the Crime Data Explorer","url":"https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov/","access":"Agency-level data, pulled directly. No third-party aggregators.","releaseCadence":"The FBI typically releases the prior year's full data each September."},"comparisonPopulations":[{"id":"national","name":"National decile","population":"All FBI-reporting U.S. cities with population ≥ 25,000","minPopulation":25000,"decileCutoffsViolentRate":[120,180,260,360,480,620,800,1050,1400],"note":"Cutoffs calibrated from the FBI's published city table and recomputed annually from the full national pull."},{"id":"state","name":"State decile","population":"All FBI-reporting cities in the same state with population ≥ 10,000","minPopulation":10000,"decileCutoffsViolentRate":"per-state — recomputed from that state's reporting cities","note":"Gives within-state context; a city can be a national C and a state A, or vice versa."}],"decileInterpretation":"Decile 1 = the city's violent crime rate falls at or below the first cutoff (safest ~10% of comparison cities). Decile 10 = above the highest cutoff. 1 = safest; 10 = highest violent crime rate.","letterMapping":"1–3 = A · 4–5 = B · 6–7 = C · 8 = D · 9–10 = F","refresh":{"cadence":"Twice a year","trigger":"FBI annual release each September, plus a mid-year verification pass"}},"spotScore":{"id":"spotscore-v1-planned","name":"SpotScore (API safety score)","status":"In development — available on Pro and Enterprise API plans","summary":"A 0–100 neighborhood safety rating served by the API at address level, updated daily. SpotScore combines incident frequency and severity over a trailing 12-month window with temporal decay — recent incidents weigh more than old ones.","scale":{"min":0,"max":100,"direction":"higher = safer"},"apiField":"spotScore (with crimeGrade compatibility alias)","inputs":["Incident frequency within the search radius","Incident severity (violent offenses weigh more than property offenses)","Temporal decay over a trailing 12-month window","Geographic aggregation from block level upward"],"relationToCrimeGrade":"Crime Grade is the annual, city-level, FBI-sourced decile. SpotScore is the daily, address-level API score. A neighborhood's SpotScore can move within a city whose annual Crime Grade is unchanged — both are published, and both methodologies are documented here."}},"limitations":[{"title":"Reported, not occurred","body":"The FBI relies on local agency reporting. Rates reflect what was reported to police and forwarded to the FBI, not everything that occurred. Criminologists call the gap the 'dark figure of crime' — victimization surveys consistently find roughly half of violent crime is never reported to police."},{"title":"Agency participation gaps","body":"Not every agency reports in a given year. During the SRS→NIBRS transition, some large departments missed reporting windows. A missing year for a major city shifts the national comparison pool."},{"title":"Rates are not personal risk","body":"A citywide rate averages very different neighborhoods. Two addresses in the same city can carry very different risk profiles — which is why the address-level SpotScore exists alongside the city-level Crime Grade."},{"title":"Population denominators","body":"Rates use resident population. Cities with large commuter or tourist inflows (small resident base, large daytime population) can show inflated per-capita rates."},{"title":"A grade is a comparison, not a verdict","body":"An F means 'highest decile among FBI-reporting cities' — it does not mean 'do not go there.' Most neighborhoods in most cities are safe most of the time. Hold two truths: take the data seriously, and respect the people who live in it."}],"related":{"openapi":"https://spotcrime.io/openapi.json","llmsTxt":"https://spotcrime.io/llms.txt","llmsFullTxt":"https://spotcrime.io/llms-full.txt","dataQuality":"https://spotcrime.io/data-quality","forAiAgents":"https://spotcrime.io/for-ai-agents","crimeGradeHub":"https://spotcrime.io/crime-grade"}}