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GlossaryPublic records, privacy, and data quality

Reclassification

Learn what reclassification means when an incident category changes, why historical counts may move, and what the change does not establish.

Reclassification is a change to the category assigned to a record. An agency may receive additional information, correct an earlier entry, or apply a revised coding rule. In public-safety data, reclassification can move a record between categories while leaving the number of underlying events unchanged.

How a category can change

A record's label reflects the information and classification rules used at a particular stage. A caller's description, a dispatch category, and the category in a completed incident report serve different purposes. A change between stages needs that context.

Seattle's crime-data documentation explicitly says records and classifications can change during approval and investigation. It illustrates why an earlier download and the current dashboard may differ even when both cover the same dates. Seattle Police Department dataset documentation.

Example

Hypothetical: A monthly summary contains 12 records in category A and eight in category B. After reviewing one report, an agency moves that record from A to B. The revised figures are 11 and nine. The combined total is still 20.

The change does not represent a new event. It changes how an existing event is grouped. If a reader compares only category B across two downloads, the increase could be mistaken for newly reported activity unless the revision is explained.

Common confusion

Reclassification does not, by itself, establish that an original report was false. A preliminary category can change because the initial information was incomplete. Nor does a statistical category establish a charge, court finding, or conviction; those are separate records and decisions.

A new category system presents another issue. Renaming or regrouping many records can change a trend even without any new information about individual events. A one-record correction and a system-wide change should not be described as though they have the same effect.

Comparing versions fairly

Check which field the chart uses: initial call type, final call type, report classification, or a broader analytical grouping. Compare the same field across both periods. When the categories themselves change, look for a published explanation connecting old categories with new ones.

Keep the download date when quoting a historical figure. Where available, a change log can distinguish records added later from records that were already present and recoded. Without that detail, describe the figures as different versions rather than assigning a cause the data does not establish.

Sources