The NOPD launched a new website today (Oct. 5) that will serve as a 24/7 online source for news and information from and about the police department. NOPDNews.com was developed by the City’s Office of Information Technology & Innovation in collaboration with the NOPD Public Affairs Division. The new site provides a more prominent platform for the NOPD to post important public safety information and surveillance videos as well as blogs covering positive news from inside the department and policing data. It is also the host for the NOPD’s new, interactive open data portal called MAX, links to open policing data and analysis, and Uniform Crime Reports.

“The NOPD is leading the country on making police data and public safety information available and easily accessible to the communities we serve,” said NOPD Superintendent Michael Harrison. “NOPDNews.com gives the public a one-stop shop for everything they need to know about what’s happening with public safety in their neighborhood. I am committed to continuing to build trust with our community by being transparent about the work that we do every day.”

Starting today, all press releases from the department will be posted to NOPDNews.com. Older releases are searchable from NOPDNews.com, and will remain searchable on the department’s government site at www.nola.gov/nopd as well as other information and services.

In addition to the new website, the NOPD has updated branding on all social media outlets to make accounts easier for the public to follow:

• www.facebook.com/nopdnews
• www.twitter.com/nopdnews
• www.youtube.com/nopdnews

Earlier this year, the NOPD also joined the popular social networking site Nextdoor to allow the department to work together with neighborhood associations and groups to increase safety and strengthen virtual neighborhood watch.

Residents are also able to sign up for NOPD news alerts via e-mail by police district at www.nola.gov/subscribe. 

New website builds on NOPD’s commitment to transparency

NOPDNews.com builds on the department’s on-going commitment to transparency. This summer, the NOPD rolled out a significant amount of police data to the public including, calls for service data, stop and search data, metadata for body worn cameras and in-car cameras and public reports on major aspects of the consent decree. Following that, the NOPD published use of force data online for the first time ever. The release makes the NOPD one of the only departments in the nation to publish this type of data and allows the community to monitor and hold the department accountable for how it handles uses of force investigations.