Advisory committee seeks common definitions for motor‑vehicle stop data; staff warns tight timeline for vendor changes

Deputy Chief Colin Grissom told the commission that the motor vehicle stop data advisory committee — charged with improving the state’s racial‑profiling/motor‑vehicle stop reporting — has met twice and split into subcommittees to produce a definitions "dictionary" and training components.

"The bulk of what the committee has been working on is definition," Grissom said. Differences in how agencies capture and report items such as contraband create variability in statewide data; the committee hopes a common glossary will improve comparability even before any system changes are made.

Staff identified a self‑imposed timeline: any anticipated system or collection changes need to be finalized by June so RMS and ticket‑writer vendors can build the changes in time for data capture beginning Jan. 1, 2027 (reporting on 2027 calendar‑year data would occur the following January). Commissioners from agencies of different sizes warned that six months may be insufficient for vendors and smaller agencies with homegrown systems; staff said the committee is aware and will push changes out to 2028/2029 if required.

Grissom said the committee can produce meaningful improvements even through better definitions alone, which would improve "apples-to-apples" comparisons without a large system rewrite.