Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Law Enforcement/Archive 8

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Barnstar Proposal

Hi everyone!

I was looking around at some other WikiProjects, and I noticed that many of them have a Project Specific Barnstar Award. And, seeing that our Project does not have a Barnstar Award, I decided to go and make one. I would like to propose that this become the official Barnstar Award for our Wikiproject. If anyone would like to change the Image shown on the Barnstar or the wording of the Barnstar feel free to do so, the template can be found at Template:Law Enforcement Barnstar.

So without further ado here is the proposed barnstar.


Code= {{subst:Law Enforcement Barnstar}}


A Barnstar!
The Law Enforcement Barnstar
I Mifter (talk) hereby present you, WikiProject Law Enforcement with the Law Enforcement Barnstar, for your great contributions to the field of Law Enforcement Articles on Wikipedia. Keep up the good work! Mifter (talk) 15:32, 20 April 2008 (UTC)


This is the Barnstar not subseted.


Code= {{Law Enforcement Barnstar}}


The Law Enforcement Barnstar
{{{1}}}


I would love to hear your opinion on this proposal :)!--Mifter (talk) 15:32, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I like it! Well done on the creation of it very nice. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 15:34, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Likewise! Incidentally, someone needs to archive this page soon! I would do it if I had not just got off 4 hours of solid essay writing :( SGGH speak! 22:49, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
See my contribs... nearly five hours! SGGH speak! 22:50, 22 April 2008 (UTC)


Sorry...

Sorry for being away for ageesssss.

Just recently too busy for Wikipedia etc... :(

But have recently invested in a BlackBerry, so I can hopefully get back into the spirit of things :)

Hows everyone doing?

Regards Dep. Garcia ( Talk + | Help Desk | Complaints ) 19:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Welcome Back!! Not much has happened in you absence :), the only thing of note that I can think of is my new Barnstar proposal which is the topic above this one ;). Anyways, Welcome Back, --Mifter (talk) 19:48, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
Its Dep. Garcia on BlackBerry, ahh thanks for the update :) Regards 195.189.143.43 (talk) 20:34, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Welcome back! Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 07:23, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

So what's forward is one at the moment, I know one has just finished but is there anything I can do? In the meantime I'll clear out the unrated articles section :) Dep. Garcia ( Talk + | Help Desk | Complaints ) 17:39, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

The Third Forward has just gone, but you might as well amount some stuff for the next one and hopefully win some awards. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 17:41, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, right ok :) shall do! Dep. Garcia ( Talk + | Help Desk | Complaints ) 17:43, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
An officers work is never done, eh Dep? SGGH speak! 09:32, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Nope. Also: "once a copper, always a copper". Not spoke to you for long time. How's it going? How's specials? Regards Dep. Garcia ( Talk + | Help Desk | Complaints ) 14:54, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Rocks, as always. Love it SGGH speak! 16:12, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
Excellent =) Glad you love it. Dep. Garcia ( Talk + | Help Desk | Complaints ) 17:41, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Talk Page Archived

Hi everyone, per SGGH's request, I have just archived our project's talk page. The archive can be found at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Law Enforcement/Archive 7, by clicking on the Aug 28th 07 - April 16th 08 link in the archive box at the top of the page, or by clicking the number 7 next to the word archive in the talk page header. Thanks, --Mifter (talk) 20:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Mifter SGGH speak! 09:32, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

New Symbol

The barnstar topic above reminded me, I asked the wonderful User:Red Gown if she could design us a new logo for the project. I believe it is coming along though I haven't seen any sketches yet. I shall upload the new one for comments when it is ready. SGGH speak! 07:46, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Sounds Good, from the Image that she has drawn and had you up-load (Found here), she appears to be an accomplished artist :). I can't wait to see the new logo :).--Mifter (talk) 01:25, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
I can definetly get a few thumbnail sketches generated to see what everyone prefers. Would like to do a vectored drawing with the type, but might have to settle for a non digital version in the meantime (until I can get Illustrator CS3 set up here). Glad to help! Red Gown (talk) 00:55, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Taser RfC

An RfC has been opened at Talk:Taser#RFC: Criticism. Flatscan (talk) 03:11, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Quality / consistency of LEA stub and start class articles - a solution ?

Folks,

I have been browsing around Wikipedia now for a few months and am somewhat saddened by the poor state of many stub and start class articles. And, law enforcement agency articles are not immune . . . I do realise though that is an inherent problem with the nature of Wikipedia . . .

It occured to me that if the article creators could be given a running start, that this might help to get better quality articles, sooner.

To this end I have put together an article generator, which will generate stub / start class articles, by allowing article creators to simply fill in a template.

The first cut of this article generating template can be found at User:Pee Tern/Sandbox/Template/Gen stub Law enforcement agency.

An example of a generated article cab be found at User:Pee Tern/Sandbox/Template/Gen stub Law enforcement agency/example.

Initial documentation is available at User:Pee Tern/Sandbox/Template/Gen stub Law enforcement agency/doc.

What do people think ?

Is it viable ?

Comments please, before I do much more work on it.

If it is a goer, what should THE standard be / look like / sections / section titles, etc. ?

Peet Ern (talk) 07:02, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

My only thought at the moment, apart from that this is a very good, well thought out idea, is that you might want to offer a simpler option as well, as in few cases do users have access to all that information. ... SGGH speak! 12:34, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks SGGH. I am not sure if you mean a simpler template, or perhaps not scare (new) Wikipedians by offering up a simpler example. If editors do not have the data they simply do not provide it. For example, see User:Pee Tern/Sandbox/Template/Gen stub Law enforcement agency/simpleexample for example. Peet Ern (talk) 06:28, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
As I have said before, I am opposed to the growing use of templates and infoboxes in Wikipedia. I appreciate you have put a lot of work into this template and well done for that, but I'm afraid I can't support the incresed use of these things. They're far too rigid and I believe they're a hindrance, rather than an aid, to good article writing. – Necrothesp (talk) 13:00, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Obviously I think more templates are a good idea. However, I am not sure that we are in fundamental disagreement. I am definitely not suggesting that articles should be templated. I too would very strongly agree that this would stifle good and lateral encyclopdic content. Here I am only trying to get people off to a better start than they have now, to get better encylcopedic content. I would hope that if this approach is adopted then there would be a "policy" that generated stubs / start class articles should be subst:ed as soon as possible and there after edited manually. Peet Ern (talk) 06:28, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Security police - appropriateness?

Folks,

I refer you to Security police, and see apparently long standing issues in Talk:Security police.

IMHO this article has many issues and is so bad it possibly should be deleted. Does any one have any references to validate that security police is a real term?

A google for security police gives the top hit as the Wikipedia one!

A google for "security police" leads me to believe the term is not common, and only applies in a relatively small number of specific instances, which should be agency/organisation articles anyway.

If I can get hold of something to refer to the term, I might consider doing a dewrite, about the 'term', rather than about 'agencies of this type'. If not, perhaps it should be nominated for deletion?

Peet Ern (talk) 05:50, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I must admit, when I first saw the article a while back "Security Police" meant nothing to me. Despite being heavily interested in policing topics I had never come across it, I also question if the title is a "real term". Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 09:35, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Security police is certainly a real term. It's been in use for many years and in many languages. However, it's usually used to refer to national political/secret police forces (e.g. the Nazi Sicherheitspolizei) and, as the article states, used to be used to refer to private security forces in the UK (I can vouch for this latter, as I work in an archive which holds relevant material). However, I too had never heard the usage in the context mostly described before reading this article - to me the term suggests totalitarian states. Therefore, it shouldn't be deleted, but more corroborative evidence probably needs to be collected of this particular usage. – Necrothesp (talk) 23:14, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
There is an issue with the name. Most of the article is about what would be called "special police" in the US and "special constables" in Commonwealth countries. In the US, "security police" is what the Air Force calls its MPs. Squidfryerchef (talk) 23:11, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
Out of interest, which Commonwealth countries equate special constables to security police? In the UK, special constables are part-time volunteer police officers serving in almost every police force. We don't have a special name for the forces described here as security police. – Necrothesp (talk) 12:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
I thought in Canada, for example, campus police were called "University Constables", and that "Special Constables" was an umbrella term for various types of peace officers other than the regular police, such as game wardens. Squidfryerchef (talk) 03:50, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me more and more that the article needs a complete rewrite, more about the term, than about the type of agency, a sort of disambiguation - etomology / history hybrid ? Peet Ern (talk) 00:43, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikiproject Prisons

If anyone's interested, I've proposed a new wikiproject for the creation of articles regarding specific prisons here. --Cdogsimmons (talk) 20:37, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

LEA powers - new article

Folks,

If any one is interested - I have put up a new article Law enforcement agency powers.

I suggest that specific LEA powers are now categorised in Category:Law enforcement agency powers, which I have made a sub category of Category:Law enforcement techniques.

There might be a few more techniques which I will move from techniques to powers over time.

Peet Ern (talk) 07:46, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Oak Bay Police Department

A proposed deletion template has been added to the article Oak Bay Police Department, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice should explain why (see also "What Wikipedia is not" and Wikipedia's deletion policy). You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised because even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. Do you want to opt out of receiving this notice? KenWalker | Talk 17:54, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

This article now has an Afd Tag on it. Please go to the articles page to help keep this article.EMT1871 (talk) 00:58, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
The result was merge/redirect to Oak Bay, British Columbia. --KenWalker | Talk 23:37, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Notability

Archived. Peet Ern (talk) 23:55, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal now at Wikipedia:Notability (law enforcement agency)
Discussion at Wikipedia talk:Notability (law enforcement agency)
Peet Ern (talk) 00:21, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
The following is an archived discussion concerning notability of law enforcement agencies. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in new sections on the discussion page, by clicking here.

In light of the above AfD, I think we need to decide on some criteria for notability, or if some already exist then find them, for police departments. Any ideas, do some exist already? SGGH speak! 10:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Whatever criteria is used, it should include a very large percentage of departments of cities over a million people, a very small percentage of departments of small towns, and an in-between percentage of departments from medium-sized cities. In a nutshell, the criteria should be "Notable among police departments," i.e. either famous or infamous inside or outside of law enforcement. For example, running a model crime lab that is copied by numerous other departments, or running a shoddy crime lab that sets the standard for what not to do. Also, we are talking about departments that are connected to a town or other larger body, i.e. departments whose content can be part of a larger article. Stand-alone entities, such as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, bounty hunters, private military organizations, etc., would have to qualify under general notability requirements. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 21:27, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed As a relatively new wikipedian I am rather confused where the line in the sand regarding notability is drawn. At the top end of the scale, there is no problem with notability, for an obviously notable item it is obvious. The problem is where notability trails off. I have seen a few debates about notability and it seems to me that it boils down more to the number of wikipedians with some interest in the topic rather than consistent intrinsic notability.

My view is that any entity or idea which has or has had a non trivial impact on the fabric, structure, or social norms of the society it is or was part of is inherently and intrinsicly notable. This could be a single major impact for a short time or many minor impacts over a long period of time. This would include all settlements as it does now, and probably all fire/police/ambulance etc. It would not include the local florist or hair dresser. Note that this should also exclude many of the horse jockeys, never heard of by 99.9999999% of the population pop music groups and recordings, and many of the who on earth were they sports people, but would include all sports people representing their country no matter how briefly, and would include most politicians, so while my suggestion would include Oak Bay Police Department, it is still a higher bar than the current wiki standard.
While it is easy to do a google measure, this really only measures material with very recent electronic relevance. We need to be careful of any measure we use to ensure that they are invertable, that is, a measure whose high values show notability, does a low value mean not notable ? This is not the case with the google measure. There is a massive amount of yet to be converted hard copy material in archives world wide.

I suspect there is somewhere like the village pump where a link to this discussion could be sent to encourage consensus building. I agree to rely only on the "google test" is somewhat ridiculous. SGGH speak! 22:05, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Peet Ern (talk)
Exactly. A point I have made again and again. Too many editors seem to believe that if it's not featured highly on a Google search then it's not notable. That standard means that very minor modern "celebrities" are notable and many important figures from history who are not considered important in modern pop culture are not notable, which is clearly ridiculous. Print sources are every bit as relevant for notability as electronic sources (if not more so, since it takes time and effort to publish a print source against a few minutes to stick something on a website).
My instinct is to keep all articles on law enforcement agencies, however small, for the reasons given by Peet Ern. However, I can see the difficulties with the thousands of small American municipal police departments, most of which have little to distinguish one from the other. While I would not personally propose any article on an agency for deletion or support any attempt to delete such an article, I would say we should definitely keep the following and argue strenuously for their retention:
  • a) All national agencies, whatever the size.
  • b) All other territorial agencies with at least one hundred officers (which covers the police departments of pretty much all cities and counties of any size in the USA and Canada).
  • c) All specialist agencies (e.g. park, port, airport etc police), whatever the size (they tend to be much more interesting and varied than ordinary territorial agencies).
  • d) Any agency that has had extensive media coverage or a particular reason to be covered, as per usual notability guidelines.
-- Necrothesp (talk) 08:16, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
100 may be too low a bar, and there are way too many specialized agencies. First off, notability shouldn't be an automatic cutoff: We should set our criteria so it is extremely likely police forces greater than some size would qualify and pretty unlikely that police forces smaller than some other size will not. For example, if we think "100" is a good number, then if our policy excludes relatively few departments that have more than 100 officers and excludes most departments that have, say, fewer than 50, then we know we accomplished the goal. I don't know if 100 is too low a bar - we need to get dept. sizes for cities of 100,000-1,000,000 people so we can see what we want to make sure we include.
Also, these days many schools, hospitals, and other government entities have their own police forces. Many of these police forces are small, consisting of only a handful of officers. There's a big difference between the University Of Bigstate Campus Police Department with 50 officers and Small Regional College Campus Police Dept. with 5 officers or Local Community School District Police Department with 2 sworn officers. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 14:01, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
National agencies should only be covered if that country considers them of high importance. If it's a cabinet-level or immediate-sub-cabinet-level position, then sure. If the national police function more like park police than the FBI, hardly ever get a mention in the media except when a crime occurs in a national park or when budget time comes around, and on paper they report to the head of the park service who reports to the assistant undersecretary of the interior, then I think we can exclude this one. I'm not saying there are any such police departments, only that it shouldn't be automatic. In any case we should defer to judgments of the locality wikiproject for national police forces. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 14:05, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
I don't really agree with this. The Kew Constabulary, for instance, is a very small force, but I think it still deserves an article. School and college forces may be an exception, since I agree that there are a large number of them in the USA and most of them are much the same as each other. Your national criteria would exclude the United States Park Police (who are pretty much exactly what you describe), which I think is a little extreme! In the US, incidentally, departments with about 100 officers usually police cities of about 40,000 population (so one can probably assume that cities of 100,000 probably average about 200-250 officers). You may want to look at a draft list which I compiled some time ago to get some idea of department sizes in the USA. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:20, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
Both the US Park Police and the Kew Constabulary should only be included if they have "extensive media coverage or a particular reason to be covered, as per usual notability guidelines." I know the Park Police has, if it is notable, then the Kew Constabulary has also. Those who don't qualify can be in a larger list. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 16:19, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps we should draw up a debate over at WP:N? SGGH speak! 22:07, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Other Idea

Perhaps we should create a guideline Page such as WP:SCHOOL and name it something like WP:POLICE (with the full name of Wikipedia:Notability (police)) and then move this discussion to the talk page of WP:POLICE because if you look at WP:SCHOOL the guideline is still being worked on/tweaked even though the page has already been created and it eliminates the need to hop back here to see the discussion because all the discussion can be kept on the same page as the guideline will be once we can all agree on something and achieve consensus and make it an official policy. Also, when we finalize the guideline it will be easier for people to find the discussion from which the guideline came out of thus improving transparency making it easier for future editors to find the original discussion and change the guideline as necessary in the future. All the Best,--Mifter (talk) 00:10, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
I would support this idea. SGGH speak! 10:42, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I support it too. I also think there needs to be more intrinsic definitive material in WP:N. WP:N really reads as notable elsewhere so it can be notable in Wikipedia, rather than it is notable because of the nature of the thing the article is about so it can be notable in Wikipedia. Peet Ern (talk) 04:42, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

First cut - Notability (law enforcement agency)

I have drafted a first cut at User:Pee Tern/Notability (law enforcement agency).

If it has merit, please let me know so that I can move it into WP space.

Comments here please if any before it gets moved for the full discussion.

Peet Ern (talk) 07:37, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

If I see nothing contrary on this in the next 18 hours or so, I will move it into WP space and set up the talk page for the debate, including "archiving" this section, and referencing the other related current discussions.
Note that based on the first cut above of the notability guide Oak Bay Police Department would probably NOT be deemed notable, BUT Larne Harbour Police probably WOULD BE deemed notable. There would probably be a very close match to the classification in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Law Enforcement#Intent to PROD non-notable Canadian municipal police departments.
Only comment here on the proposal if you feel the first cut above should not be initiated as a proposal. Discussing its content will be part of the proposal.
My main concern with what I have drafted is that if we take a line like it, it is so much higher than vast numbers of other crap articles / micro stubs, etc. in other subject areas.
Cheers. Peet Ern (talk) 05:23, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in new sections on the discussion page, by clicking here. No further edits should be made to this section.

Riot control

I am Back after one month

Hi all can any one tell me what happen of a poll which was conducted in Mid may for a banister?? Suyogaerospacetalk to me! 05:02, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Welcome Back Suyogaerospace, anyways as was decided here the Barnstar Passed and is now Official :D. Anyways Welcome Back and All the Best, --Mifter (talk) 18:31, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

WP:FLRC of FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives

I have nominated FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives for the removal of its Featured list status. The discussion can be found at Wikipedia:Featured list removal candidates/FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives. Regards, Matthewedwards (talk • contribs • email) 02:14, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

New Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment

He everyone, I was just taking a quick look at WP:ASSESS and I have just noticed that there is a new article assessment class. The C-class Article Rating has just been approved and is starting to be used in articles, Now I have already created Category:C-Class Law enforcement articles but now we need to take a serious look at our Start-class and B-class articles and see if any of them would be better suited to being C-class Articles. I have already updated the {{WPLE}} template to accommodate the new C-class, but I am thinking that we should do something like WP:MILHIST's B-class assessment drive to assess all B-class and Start-class articles and see if they would be better Suited as C-class articles with a Golden Wiki Award for the top assessor with the Project Barnstar and other Awards also being handed to encourage people to participate (Participants Wouldn't have to be in the Project because I do all of the WP:MILHIST's events and I'm not even in the project :P). I look froward to hearing your feedback about this :). All the Best, --Mifter (talk) 18:29, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

AfD for Nelson Police Department and Saanich Police Department

Two articles within the scope of this project have been proposed for deletion as non notable police departments. --KenWalker | Talk 23:47, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Intent to PROD non-notable Canadian municipal police departments

I checked the departments in {{Law enforcement agencies in Canada}} and a number of them are small towns with no claim of notability. I will be Proposing those for deletion within a few days.

Here's the data:

Big cities and notable forces, no action

I will leave these alone, they have enough notability to stay or are large city/1,000,000+-population departments which are almost certainly notable if someone bothered to do the research. Since future editors may not be so kind, please make sure these have a claim of notability and if they do not, find and add one.

Small towns with marginal notability or Medium-sized towns with marginal or no notability: Wait then redirect

These claim notability but the notability is marginal or they are part of a medium-sized/100,000+ people town which indicates some likelihood of notability that does not appear in the article. These will be redirected rather than deleted due to a potential need to recreate them in the future once notability is established.

Small towns with no claim of notability: Wait then PROD

These appear to be smaller municipalities that do not claim notability and qualify for Speedy-A7 deletion, please update them soon if you want them to stay. If they are for towns over 100,000 people, multi-municipality forces, or other unique situations, please beef up the articles and comment below. After a few days I will WP:PROD these.

Micro-stubs: Wait then PROD

These are one- or two-line stubs without any claim of notability, they easily qualify for Speedy-A7 deletion. Please write a real article with a real claim of notability and reply below if you want them to stay:

Deletion action in progress

These are already the subject of a PROD or AfD action, please address the concerns of the PRODder or AfDer then either remove the PROD or participate in the AfD. If you remove the PROD, please reply below.

  • Gatineau Police - PROD expires 2008-06-28 02:51. Stub. Medium-sized town. I applied PROD2.
  • 6/23 PROD REMOVED, this now belongs in "Micro-stubs: Wait then PROD" above. Rather than AFD it will be redirected along with the other medium-sized towns.
  • 6/23 PROD REMOVED, this now belongs in "Micro-stubs: Wait then PROD" above. Rather than AFD it will be redirected along with the other medium-sized towns.

Existing redirects, no action

These are already redirects:

davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 04:26, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Your comments

Have your say here

  • Regina is the capital of the province of Saskatchewan.
  • Montreal is the second-largest city in Canada with 1.8 million residents.

DoubleBlue (Talk) 06:19, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I personally would rather they all redirected/were merged into the article for the town rather than dump the information in an AfD/Prod SGGH speak! 10:41, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm not completely convinced of this for smaller towns that don't show signs of notability or for micro-stub articles, but I'm not vehemently opposed to it either. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 13:41, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I'd prefer simply merging the article into the relevant municipality article too. It's less tedious than AfD, and points readers to the most relevant location on Wikipedia for that subject if it doesn't warrant it's own article. Mindmatrix 15:05, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
Merging makes a lot of sense to me. The police info can then be easily expanded/updated in the municipality until a separate article is justified. DoubleBlue (Talk) 16:18, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
DoubleBlue: I probably should treat provincial capitals as if they were large cities, as provincial capital police deal with issues most police departments don't and are quite likely to be notable, even if the article doesn't show it at this time. Montreal is already in the big-city list. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 13:40, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
Add Fredericton Police to that list. Mindmatrix 15:05, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I'm undecided about whether capital city police departments are likely to be notable but mentioned here for interest's sake and, as you say, they are important cities, whether large or not. DoubleBlue (Talk) 16:18, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

As I have already said, I oppose the deletion of articles about departments with over 100 officers and I will continue to do so. The Service de police de Longueuil apparently has over 500 officers for God's sake! This seems to me to be deletion for deletion's sake. – Necrothesp (talk) 19:27, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

As I said above (Link to comment), I still believe that we should open discussion about creating a set set of guidelines much like as being done at Wp:SCHOOL before starting to delete tons of articles. All the best, --Mifter (talk) 19:53, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I rather dislike the instruction creep that comes from special notability guidelines. The general notability guidelines should be sufficient. A police service can be presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage (addressing the department directly in detail) in reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject. DoubleBlue (Talk) 21:14, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
I think we all agree that if the subject article meets the general notability guidelines, then it is notable. The disagreement comes over terms like "significant coverage." If a small-town newspaper prints a weekly police blotter, is that "significant coverage" since the 2-man police department gets at least 50 mentions a year from a reliable, independent source? I think not, but other editors may disagree. The same local paper probably gives more coverage to the local youth sports teams and to local churches. Imagine a Wikipedia where every small-town church, school, and sports team was considered notable because they got a few dozen mentions from their local "independent, reliable" newspaper but big-city equivalents were shut out because the local paper didn't cover them nearly as much if at all. I'll pass, thanks. As for most of the articles in this list, the articles do not cite "significant coverage" and I'm not willing to assume that just because a department has 100 officers it has significant coverage. Show me on a case-by-case basis, or show me that enough of them do that it's likely that almost all of them do. I am willing to give large city departments - cities over 1M - and decent-sized specialty departments a pass because I've seen enough significant coverage of similar departments that I'm convinced over 90% of such departments will have significant coverage, and it's pointless to "make a point" and delete them for failing to claim notability. With enough evidence, you can convince me that the same is true for departments of over 100 officers. A good start would be to pick 5 such articles and beef them up using reliable sources. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 21:54, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
You seem to be addressing me but I largely agree with you and have no interest in convincing you they're notable. The user who suggests that departments with greater than 100 officers should have articles is User:Necrothesp.
Significant coverage would mean addressing the department itself (e.g., a news story about the department or a book on the service's history). DoubleBlue (Talk) 01:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Larne Harbour Police

Given some of the comments above on a webpage devoted to the subject it's probably a losing battle, but the article on Larne Harbour Police, one of Britain's few specialist police forces, is up for deletion. Personally, I think this is the thin end of the wedge and if we allow these articles to be deleted then the deletionists will soon be suggesting that we delete articles even on large territorial forces in the name of the Great (and highly subjective) God "Notability". Oddly, this deletionist mania will almost certainly not extend to the growing armies of talentless minor celebrities who contribute absolutely nothing to our world but are covered extensively by internet fan sites and are therefore considered "notable" by virtue of how many times they appear on Google. A sad comment on Wikipedia today. – Necrothesp (talk) 16:38, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Hear hear, well written. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 17:21, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up. Sadly, there isn't enough in the article to convince me it's worth keeping. See my comments on the AfD page. Some articles should not be written in the first place unless their case for notability is clear and compelling. Other topics, such as countries, species, atomic elements, heads of state, etc. are "must have" articles and should have at least stubs because there is a glaring hole if there is no article bout the topic. Small police forces are in the former category. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 17:32, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Regarding minor celebrities: PROD away, then send to AfD. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 17:36, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Sadly, there are enough drooling fans that they won't get deleted. Police forces just aren't sexy enough. And are more likely to appear in print sources than internet sources; many editors misguidedly seem to think the latter are more valid. Print sources are more difficult to get hold of, so articles written from them are actually more valuable, since most people don't have access. Ironically, however, many editors seem to believe that if it doesn't appear on multiple Google hits then it isn't notable. – Necrothesp (talk) 18:32, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Print sources are great but this article has no sources and has been tagged with that concern since April. I agree that ghits are not dependable as a notability judge but if this article was written from print sources, what are they? I suspect it's all OR. DoubleBlue (Talk) 18:50, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
OR? In what possible way is it OR? Please read WP:OR, which defines it as "unpublished facts, arguments, speculation, and ideas; and any unpublished analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to advance a position". None of the three sentences in the article are in any way original research. That's another thing that's increased on WP lately - unfounded allegations of OR by people who actually mean it isn't referenced (which isn't the same thing at all). You could reference all the info in the article just by doing a Google search. – Necrothesp (talk) 19:02, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
It's OR if the editor added the info from his personal knowledge without consulting any references. I suspect that's the case. I'm not saying it couldn't be referenced but you did say such articles are less likely to have internet sources. DoubleBlue (Talk) 19:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
No, sorry, it doesn't say that. Read it again. OR is quite specifically defined. It is a statement that is not verifiable, not one that isn't verified as yet. There is a huge difference. Your definition is one I've heard editors claim before, but it's certainly not the one in the policy. The material here should certainly be sourced, but since it clearly can be sourced (since pretty much all it says is that the force exists) it is also certainly not Original Research. – Necrothesp (talk) 20:27, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Not interested in an argument but if it's not sourced then OR can certainly be suspected. From WP:OR

Wikipedia is not the place to publish your own opinions, experiences, or arguments. Citing sources and avoiding original research are inextricably linked: to demonstrate that you are not presenting original research, you must cite reliable sources that provide information directly related to the topic of the article, and that directly support the information as it is presented.

Cheers, DoubleBlue (Talk) 22:12, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
And police forces are very sexy SGGH speak! 16:03, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
Only to police officers, sadly! – Necrothesp (talk) 16:37, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

C Class

I may have missed where this was discussed, but could someone run me through why there is now a C class in assessment? I may just be being dense... SGGH speak! 19:58, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

It was discussed at WT:ASSESS as a means of making Start-class a little less broad. I'm not convinced it's needed but it appears to be going forward. DoubleBlue (Talk) 20:11, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Ah right. SGGH speak! 16:02, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Peer Review

Hi everyone, I have just put FBI Buffalo Field Office up for a peer review and if anyone had the time I was wondering if they could go here and leave a few comments about the article I would much appreciate it. I am hoping to get the article to GA or FA soon and I am looking for outside input to help me improve the article to GA/FA quality. Thanks and All the Best, --Mifter (talk) 01:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Ad

Hi everyone, Seeing that many other Wikiprojects have a "Wikipedia Ad" I thought I would create one for us, many users have the template {{Wikipedia ads}} on there userpages which will display one of the 149 "Wikipedia Ads" at random each time that someone loads the page. Therefore to help increase recruitment and awareness for our Project I have created one of these ads and I have introduced it into the Ad rotation.


Here is the ad:


Wikipedia ad for Wikipedia:WikiProject Law Enforcement
Wikipedia adsfile info – #149


If you want to display this ad ONLY (Not any of the other 148 ads) then add {{Qxz-ads|ad=149}} to your userpage. See my Userpage (Link) for an example.

I am open to feedback about that ad (I can if anyone wants change the wording of the Ad). All the Best, --Mifter (talk) 03:13, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Fantastic, well done mate. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 17:55, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Articles flagged for cleanup

Currently, 578 of the articles assigned to this project, or 26.1%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 18 June 2008.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. Subsribing is easy - just add a template to your project page. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. --B. Wolterding (talk) 17:53, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Detailed lists of officers and vehicles

I would like to get this projects input on the appropraitness of detailed lists within articles on law enforcement agencies detailing all vehciles and officers within the force. I feel such lists are unencylopedic (wikipedia is not a law enfcorcement directory, or even a place to list all the different types of vehicles an agency has.) This is based on the article at Wandsworth Parks Police where I removed two such sections vehicles section and staffing section. These were removed based on my examining of several high profile law enforcement agency articles (and a few other random ones) to see if it was a common practice. It did not appear to be so however my actions has been questioned here. Any input would be greatly aprpeciated, thanks. Chrislk02 Chris Kreider 19:06, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I think this is too much, unless this information somehow makes the department special. For example, if it has unique vehicles, vehicles put to a unique use, the first-of-a-kind use of a particular vehicle, or if the number or types of vehicles or number of personnel are important in explaining this particular department. For example, if a department suffered a disaster where they lost 1/3 of their force, it's helpful to know the size of the force before and after the disaster and if the disaster was recent, its current size. Likewise, the "largest police force in the state/province/country" should have its size listed because that is backup to the claim of "largest." But in general, no, this information shouldn't be there. In any case, it should be in the article body not infoboxes.davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 20:19, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
The purpose of an encyclopedia is to provide information. By removing sections of information, the article is simply made less informative, and less useful. Of course there is information which those close to a particular police force might have available, that simply would not enhance a wikipedia article - for example, Sergeant Jones may know that the walls of the offices on the second floor of his police station are painted green, but we would all agree that this is hardly relevant information. However, for someone wanting to find out more about Sergeant Jones's police force, details such as how many colleagues he has, and what equipment they use, certainly is pertinent. If you found other police articles that did not contain this information, then maybe those articles are lacking!? It is not a good indication that the Wandsworth Parks Police article has too much information. In any case, I could certainly point you to other police articles with similar information. However, this is hardly the point. Every article needs editing in it's own way. The WPP article is about an unusually small and specialist police force, therefore the number of its staff and the type of its vehicles are of particular relevance and interest. Timothy Titus Talk To TT 21:32, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
A note for davidwr - the format used was not infoboxes, but a wikitable. Wikitables exist on this project for presenting information to the reader in a structured and/or tabulated form. It was my opinion (and still is) that the information was more clearly presented in this format, rather than a body of text. It allowed a simple yet clear summary of numbers under the three key sections of police officers, support staff, and administrators/trainers. If you don't like wikitables, take that up elsewhere; but whilst they are available as a tool to editors, I hope editors will go on using them; personally I find information much clearer in a tabulated form than as chunks of text. Timothy Titus Talk To TT 21:32, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a collection of all information. It is an encyclopedia, and therefore supposed to contain encyclopedic information. There is a big distinction, and it is a common misunderstanding that the point of Wikipedia is to contain a list of all information pertaining to a topic. The information provided in the vehicles and officers section is more appropriate on the forces website itself. AN external link to this would also be appropriate, however having it all within the article is in my opinion not. Why not list all the different types of officers in each rank for every major army in the world? What about all the vehicles (in detail by type and role) for every major army? While this may seem absurd, these are similar situations. There is nothing wrong with a sentence telling how many officers and/or vehicles a force may have, this is encyclopedic. A detailed list of every vehicle (I.E>, a list that has, 2 marked bicycles as an item in the list) seems to me to be problomatic. Chrislk02 Chris Kreider 21:44, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
I concur. There is a continuum between outright trivia and truly encyclopedic information. I see these counts as much closer to the trivia end of the scale. Other editors disagree. Hence the discussion. Even though this is not a paper encyclopedia, there is a cost to having minutia and trivia in articles: It makes the truly encyclopedic information much less prominent to the casual reader. We could go to the extreme, and include summaries of each police department's budgets including office supplies, but that would be absurdly un-encyclopedic. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 14:10, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
What is and is not encyclopaedic? Who decides? When editors say something is "unencyclopaedic", it often seems to me that what they really mean is "I'm not interested in it". I for one am interested in the structure of police forces and the numbers of officers in each rank; I am not, however, interested in their office supply budgets, the names of each officer, or the serial numbers of their vehicles! – Necrothesp (talk) 15:27, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
Who decides? Ultimately, the editors of Wikipedia decide, which is why it's good to have this discussion. Remember though, this is a general purpose encyclopedia, not an encyclopedia of law enforcement, employment, the economy, government organizations, office supplies, or automobiles. This discussion is analogous to what statistical information belongs in articles about non-famous athletes - as in those cases, over time, editorial consensus will emerge. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 15:39, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Frankly, I see no problem at all with providing details of organisation and types of vehicle. Nobody wants names of officers (except maybe the chief officers) or details of individual vehicles, but I see no reason whatsoever to delete useful information. Wikipedia is in the business of providing information, and what is and is not encyclopaedic is highly subjective - it is not defined by any one particular person. – Necrothesp (talk) 07:45, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

i agree totally with you. there is some information which should be left in all articles. ninety:one 09:53, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Timothy surely we should have information on a site that I beleive is of interest whether agreed with or not. After all the list of vehicles and staffing has never been challenged until Chris decided to be helpful. TopCat666 (talk) 12:01, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

No detailed lists in general:

Lists of types and numbers of vehicle (and other equipment and facilities) - yes - this is encyclopedic. Lists of individual items of equipment etc. - an asset register - NO - these are internal administrative records.

List of key personnel, executives, highly specilist technical personnel, demographic mix of personnel by education, ethnicity, age, etc., - yes - this is encyclopedic. General staff lists - NO - these are admin records.

Peet Ern (talk) 04:08, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Changes to the WP:1.0 assessment scheme

As you may have heard, we at the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team recently made some changes to the assessment scale, including the addition of a new level. The new description is available at WP:ASSESS.

  • The new C-Class represents articles that are beyond the basic Start-Class, but which need additional references or cleanup to meet the standards for B-Class.
  • The criteria for B-Class have been tightened up with the addition of a rubric, and are now more in line with the stricter standards already used at some projects.
  • A-Class article reviews will now need more than one person, as described here.

Each WikiProject should already have a new C-Class category at Category:C-Class_articles. If your project elects not to use the new level, you can simply delete your WikiProject's C-Class category and clarify any amendments on your project's assessment/discussion pages. The bot is already finding and listing C-Class articles.

Please leave a message with us if you have any queries regarding the introduction of the revised scheme. This scheme should allow the team to start producing offline selections for your project and the wider community within the next year. Thanks for using the Wikipedia 1.0 scheme! For the 1.0 Editorial Team, §hepBot (Disable) 21:36, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Does this project have any notability guidelines?

FBI Buffalo Field Office is up for GA review, and it struck me as a little odd since branch offices are rarely notable in and of themselves. In a WP:BLP1E-ish fashion this office has been involved with some recent high-profile events, but the guidance in the biography policy is to cover it in the context of those events. The policy obviously does not apply, but the logic does.

Does this project have a separate notability guideline that addresses these sorts of entities? The FBI project is marked as inactive, so I'm asking here. SDY (talk) 18:05, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

The closest we have is at Wikipedia:Notability (law enforcement agency) which is only at the proposal stage. If the proposal gets up as it stands, then based on the current content of the FBI Buffalo Field Office article I do not think it would be notable. (It would probably bomb out at least on the latter clause of the first criterion.) However, it is still much more notable than the squillion horse jockey articles, who on earth are they pop music articles, and non near earth orbit asteriod articles, etc. . . . Hence the debate / proposal. IMHO it is a goodish (looking) article, but . . . Perhaps wait and see if you get any more comment here. The notability proposal debate has gone quiet for a while. Peet Ern (talk) 23:01, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
It would be sort of strange to go from good article candidate to articles for deletion. Generalizing the article to "FBI field office" in general and using Buffalo as an example might work. SDY (talk) 23:15, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes, that might be a good approach. Peet Ern (talk) 23:53, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Comment: I definitely do not think the content should be deleted. It is definitely suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia. The question is not GA versus AfD but might be GA versus merge/generalize. Is there scope for Notable FBI field offices ? Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi everyone, well I may have a COI about this being that I wrote the article, I still believe that the article is notable, according to the proposed WP:POLICE

It has or has had a non trivial impact on the fabric, structure, or social norms of the society it is or was part of. This could be a single major impact for a short time or many minor impacts over a long period of time AND it is reasonably distinguishable by its activities from other law enforcement agencies. This latter clause means that many small local law enforcement agencies might not be notable (in their own right). For such agencies see Failure to establish notability below.

 Done It is the primary FBI presence in all of Western New York which means that it is involved in many small incidents often, also it is also occasionally involved in major drug/crime busts see here and even though the article doesn't directly mention the Buffalo Office, Cattaraugus County falls within the Offices territory and as such the FBI agents were probably from the Buffalo Field Offices Drug Program.

Comment: The proposed guideline might need more clarity here, and examples. For example, how is the FBI Buffalo Field Office reasonably distinguishable for other FBI field offices? Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

It has been the subject of significant coverage in secondary sources.

 Done See here and here and these were all in just this month alone and they are what I gathered in less that 5 minutes of searching.

It or any of its personnel have received formal third party recognition for achievements

 Done Per this the Special Agent in Charge Laurie Bennett is the first ever Female Agent to head a Field Office.

Comment: Sorry but this URL keeps page load erroring for me and I cannot see it. First female in category does not make the category (office) notable. It does perhaps make the female notable. Unless the office is making a name for itself by having a series of demographic and cultural firsts? Did the office get an award for appointing Bennett ? (Note that formal recognition means formal, not popular recognition. Popular is already covered by significant coverage in secondary sources.) Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

And for the Second Criteria

Comment: These are not criteria, but indacators that criteria have been met.

Based on the above criteria, a law enforcement agency will probably be notable if it has one or more of the following indicative characteristics:

The agency passes the following sections

a state, province, other or major country sub division agency - Being a FBI Field Office

a distinguishable specialist agency - All of its specialist programs

Comment: The guideline will have to be better worded here. Actually, I might do up a short article Specialist law enforcement agency (for Category:Specialist law enforcement agencies). Specialist here is meant to refer to specialist jurisdiction. Having specialist prorgammes does not make the agency a specialist agency. Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

the subject of significant social interest - The arrest of the Buffalo Six

operated within large geographic areas or within more than base notable populations (relative to surrounding populations at the time) - The Office is responsible for all of Western New York Including the city of Buffalo

significantly impacted crime, or public order or safety, or key role in a notable tragic event - The arrest of the Buffalo Six

Comment: This should say significantly impacted trends in crime or public order or safety. The guideline will need clarifying for its current intent. I do not know that one important investigation is an appropriate indicator here. Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

As per the above things I do think that the agency is in fact notable, also User:Somedumbyankee when you failed the article's GA proposal you said that it was non-notable which I have addressed above, but you also said that it lacked Reliable sources. But, being that the office themselves would probably be the best source for information about themselves because the FBI is a federal agency (In many other articles anything wrtitten by a U.S. Federal Agency is considered relielbe and in the Public Domain e.g. there world factbook is used as a reliable source on many articles) and saying that the FBI's information on the Field Offices Website is not reliable would negatively effect the article and as such the encyclopedia I am Ignoring the section of Wikipedia:V#Self-published_sources and Wikipedia:SELFPUB criteria 7 that say that the Offices own publications are not considered sources to base an entire article off becuase in all other regards FBI publications are considered reliable sources. And as a result I am asking User:Somedumbyankee to re-evaluate the GA proposal on the content of the article not on the sources (WP:IAR) and wither or not you beleive the article is notable (If you still need more coverage in secondary sources just tell me and I'll drag up some more info) but based upon the content of the article and wither or not you believe it meets the GA criteria. Thanks and All the Best, --Mifter (talk) 21:46, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

P.S. Thanks for the compliment about the article Peet Ern :) and thanks for the honest review Somedumbyankee:) Mifter (talk) 21:53, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Comment: Mifter, my comments above might sound a bit against FBI Buffalo Field Office being notable. They are not meant to be. But, based on the current proposal for notability I do think any field office (of any organisation) will be notable unless it is exceptional for some reason. So, either the guideline needs to be lowered, or the article's content upped, and having discussions like this is the only way it can be worked through. Peet Ern (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
Hi Peet Ern, you are entitled to your opinion and I respect that (Freedom of opinion is one of the most important rights in my opinion) and understand that discussion is the best way to work through this, and as my talk page says, I appreciate your criticism, because I see criticism not as something to be avoided but as something that should be learned from and used to make yourself a better user/person and to improve the article in question. Thanks and All the Best :), --Mifter (talk) 19:49, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
While I drafted the first cut of the current proposal, based on the consensus apparently in the archived above, I actually think it is set too high at the moment. Whether lowering the bar without going very low would allow a field office to be notable, though I am not sure. I would think that going for field offices, would also mean "police regions/districts/precints", etc., for example, and only exceptional ones of these are notable. Can you make suggestions for differentating criteria at this level ? Peet Ern (talk) 02:17, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Replying on the relevant article's page. SDY (talk)

Special Patrol Group

Can someone please explain why a well meaning insertion by me a few hours ago into the page on the Special Patrol Group has vanished? It may be that as a novice I made a technical error, but nothing at all from the original was removed and the addition was only put in to add more factual detail, bearing in mind the original work perhaps lacked some basic information about this police unit with much attention instead being given to links to stage and tv shows etc? Patrick56 Patrick56 (talk) 22:56, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I think it was removed because it was unreferenced. It is usually a good idea to reference information, although deleting uncontroversial material about its history and organisation is probably a bit extreme. – Necrothesp (talk) 16:47, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Specialist law enforcement agencies

If anyone is interested and or working on specialist law enforcement agencies:

  • There is now a stub article: Specialist law enforcement agency
  • You can use {{Infobox Law enforcement agency}} to define and categorise specialist law enforcement agencies of any of the following speciality types: institution, education, water, envher, postal, property, road, customs, corruption, rail, vehicle, protection, fraud, paramilitary, diplomatic, border, coast.
  • There is a template {{Template:Countryspecialistleacat|country}}, to create a standard category for specialist law enforcement agencies of a country.
  • There is a template {{Template:Typespecialistleacat|speciality}}, to create a standard category for specialist law enforcement agencies of a speciality type. I will create these for the above speciality types soon but others please feel free to do so if you need to in the mean time.
  • I still have to create a template {{Template:Countryspecialistpolicecat|country}}, to create a standard category for specialist police agencies of a country. These are / now will be sub categories of the relevant country's specialist lea category.
  • The above is pretty much all working as far as I can see, and is now live in Template space, but I will be keeping a close eye on it over the next few days.

Peet Ern (talk) 08:22, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Categorising US LEAs

is currently random. i propose:

  • LEAs of the USA
    • LEAs of STATE
      • State LEAs of STATE
      • Municipal police departments of STATE
      • School police departments of STATE
      • Sherrifs of STATE
      • Transit police departments of STATE
      • Defunct LEAs of STATE

now, can someone enlighten me as to the difference between municipal and county? and what do we do when there are combined agencies? ninety:one 21:31, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Support: I support this initiative. Note that it IS and should remain I think LEAs of the US. Can it be just LEAs of STATE - dropping the State at the front - see the But below?
Comment: If a standard can be defined then {{Infobox Law enforcement agency}} can do it automatically.
Note: If memory serves me correctly, I think at some of the lower levels there is a mixture of categories and list articles too!
But: What about a world view? See for example Category:Law enforcement agencies of New South Wales, a state of Australia?
Peet Ern (talk) 22:55, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
PS: There would be no sub sub category State LEAs of STATE. State LEAs get put into LEAs of STATE. Peet Ern (talk) 23:05, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but I'm puzzled as to what's wrong with the present categorisation system. There's absolutely nothing random about it, although the whole thing has been complicated by recent infobox templates which automatically add agencies to the higher level category as well as the lower level (something to which I have already expressed my opposition above and which is generally against Wikipedia guidelines). I'm obviously biased, since I largely devised the categorisation scheme, but other than adding an extra level in for state (which is a good idea given the number of articles we now have), I don't see why any titles need to be changed - the state categorisation scheme can exactly duplicate the national scheme.

Please see my comment below about category and subcategory instantiation. I too agree that this wrong. If it happening, give me an example to work with, and I will be happy to fix it. Peet Ern (talk) 05:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The correct term is "sheriffs' departments" incidentally (as it is currently named) - "sheriffs" refers to the individuals who head them. And there should definitely be a subcategory of county agencies, which include sheriffs' departments, county police departments and more ("municipal" refers to city and town departments only). School police departments, transit police departments and more come under the heading of specialist police departments - basically, any department which doesn't provide general purpose territorial policing. Combined agencies simply go into more than one category! – Necrothesp (talk) 08:37, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

about sheriffs: yes, my bad. i know that ;). how about this:
  • LEAs of the US
    • LEAs of STATE
      • State LEAs of STATE
      • County law enforcement agencies of STATE
        • County police departments of STATE
        • Sherrifs' departments of STATE [although in states where the prevailing term is 'Sheriff's Office' i suggest keeping that, like Arizona Category:Sheriff's_offices_of_Arizona (and thanks for the spelling there, it was late at night :p)].
        • Probation departments of STATE
      • Specialist police departments of STATE
        • School police departments of STATE
        • Transit police departments of STATE
        • more or less as necessary
      • Municipal police departments of STATE
      • Defunct LEAs of STATE
Question: Are sheriffs and probations sub to county or should they be sub to state as they "of STATE" and not "of COUNTY" above? Peet Ern (talk) 23:35, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
PS: Based on what Necrothesp says above, they should sub to county and of COUNTY. Peet Ern (talk) 23:43, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
Question: Are transit police always for rail systems, (subways, metros, undergrounds, trams), or do they also work on buses? Peet Ern (talk) 01:28, 5 August 2008 (UTC)
I am now on holidays too, hopefully back by 19 August. I will be back into these issues then. Peet Ern (talk) 14:10, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Does 'Municipal police departments of STATE' go into County LEAs or is it equal to that? ninety:one 10:22, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

No, municipal agencies are distinct from county agencies. Different level of government. – Necrothesp (talk) 11:30, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Added to list above. Now, there's another issue which is best discussed here. California State Police are no longer in existence. Necrothesp believes they should go into Category:State law enforcement agencies of the United States. I think we should put them into Category:Defunct state law enforcement agencies of the United States. However, Pee Tern highlighted issues about 'triple intersection categories' when I tried to do likewise with "Defunct military provosts of Germany". Should we expand all the categories from Category:Law enforcement agencies of the United States as Category:Defunct xyz LEAs of the US? ninety:one 12:34, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Frankly, I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "'triple intersection categories". I can see no problem whatsoever with expanding the categories as you suggest and this would definitely be the best course of action. – Necrothesp (talk) 12:51, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
that's fine, and i'm more than happy to do so :) ninety:one 13:07, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
Triple intersection categories or higher tend to be very sparse in existence and when they do exist they have very few members. Having scattered categories of an apparently but not big group and-or very low content member categories is (also) against category guidelines? It also leads to lets have "intersection categories" for every possible intersection . . . I am not fundamentally against this. I just asked Ninetyone to get a second opinion. See Template talk:Infobox Law enforcement agency#defunct military provosts of nation. Peet Ern (talk) 05:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Can we please ensure that we put together a world view standard, for example, based on the above:

  • LEAs of the country
    • Fed/Nat LEAs of country
    • LEAs of division name
      • Division type LEAs of division name
      • Sub division type law enforcement agencies of division mame
        • Sub division type police departments of division mame
        • Sherrifs' departments/offices of division name
        • Probation departments of division name
      • Specialist law enforcement agencies of division name <!-- not all specialist leas are police -->
        • School police departments of division name <!-- what about college and uni police -->
        • Transit police departments of division name
      • Municipal police departments of division name
      • Defunct LEAs of division mame

I should be able to have the infobox working to any agreed standard within a 2-3 of days of it being agreed. Peet Ern (talk) 05:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem with this is not every country uses the same names. Using "police department" for an agency outside the USA, for example, would be incorrect, and only Canada really comes even vaguely close to the proliferation of different agencies in the USA. You can standardise too much. Let's just stick to the USA for now. There is absolutely no need to use the same names for all countries in the spurious name of consistency. – Necrothesp (talk) 09:04, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Absolutely agree. Every country differs, and almost no nations other than Can/US have agencies below the first subdivision. The structure must be individual to each nation (save in the case of US/Can). ninety:one 13:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Sorry I had very litte time yesterday. I totally agree that using the same names everywhere be completely wrong. However, there needs to be some commonality in structure. To the level that things are common we should use the one world view structure. Below that it should diverge for each context. Peet Ern (talk) 01:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, I had that problem with "school" departments too. The problem is that Americans use "school" to refer to all levels of education, whereas most other countries only use it to refer to primary and secondary education, but not tertiary education. That tends to confuse the issue. I definitely think "real" school departments need to be distinguished from university and college departments. – Necrothesp (talk) 09:14, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Could we have something like:
Peet Ern (talk) 01:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
I've been using "Specialist police departments of STATE" because the old US-wide cat placed them in "Specialist police departments of the United States". If that's wrong, I'll happily change it to "Specialist law enforcement agencies of STATE". ninety:one 13:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
I think at the divtype level it should be lea and not police. Peet Ern (talk) 01:44, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

PS: I will probably have only very limited InterNet access or even no access for the next three days. So if you guys can settle on and dcoument a world view compatible lea categorisation scheme, and the specific form of this for the US in the meantime, I will happily implement it as soon as after the three days. Peet Ern (talk) 04:25, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Since educational institution police departments are almost exclusively an American phenomenon, I think the clearer categorisation would be Category:School police departments of the United States (or by state) and Category:University and college police departments of the United States (or by state), both directly under Category:Specialist law enforcement agencies of the United States (or by state). No need to overcomplicate matters and the two categories should make it obvious what the difference is. After all, non-tertiary departments are usually called "school" departments, whereas tertiary departments are usually named after their institution ("school" only being a colloquialism for tertiary institutions)-- Necrothesp (talk) 19:33, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

So far, the only state-level distinction is 'Specialist PDs of STATE' and I don't think we need to go any further then that. I have tried to keep specialist PDs in their specialism-specific category at the national level, so an example would be an article in "Cat:Specialist police departments of STATE" and "Cat:School police departments of the United States". ninety:one 19:46, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

New guideline

Folks,

Based on my best interpretation of the above, and the consistent bits of what is already happening, I have started to draft a guideline Categorisation (law enforcement agencies).

Comments here please, before I put it into Wikipedia space as a proposal.

I note a few people are having voluntary or forced Wikibreaks at the moment, so I will not move it for a while.

Cheers. Peet Ern (talk) 06:21, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I am now on holidays too, hopefully back by 19 August. I will be back into these issues then. Peet Ern (talk) 14:10, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Infoboxes and categorisation again

Pee Tern, you seem to be our resident authority on infoboxes. If we must have them, can they please, please be cleaned up to only categorise agencies in the appropriate subcategory and not in every higher category as well. The categorisation system, which used to be relatively simple, has been turned into a complete mess by the proliferation of infoboxes. For instance, Category:Law enforcement agencies of the United States used to only contain its subcategories, with individual agencies going into those - now it contains many agencies which are in it as well as being in the subcategories. This is contrary to Wikipedia guidelines. If infoboxes are unable to do this then maybe categorisation should be removed from them and once again left to editors. – Necrothesp (talk) 13:10, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I think most of that is fixable by adding a State parameter somewhere, but I'm having problems with agencies categorised in 'Law enforcement agencies of STATE' and I can't get them into one of the sub-state cats we agreed above. ninety:one 17:42, 23 July 2008 (UTC)
another problem - probably more easily fixed - is that defuncts don't categorise by State but rather by United States. ninety:one 17:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Necrothesp, we are NOT in disgreement. {{Infobox Law enforcement agency}} does not put articles in both the parent and subcategory. There are two reasons why this might be "apparently" be happening:

One: There is no state subcategory available. This would appear to be the case for 40 odd US states. There are only 11 states in Law enforcement agencies of the United States by state for example.

Law enforcement agencies of the United States by state
Law enforcement agencies of Alabama
Law enforcement agencies of Alaska
Law enforcement agencies of Arizona
Law enforcement agencies of Arkansas
Law enforcement agencies of California
Law enforcement agencies of Colorado
Law enforcement agencies of Connecticut
Law enforcement agencies of Delaware
Law enforcement agencies of Florida
Law enforcement agencies of Georgia (U.S. state)
Law enforcement agencies of Hawaii
Law enforcement agencies of Idaho
Law enforcement agencies of Illinois
Law enforcement agencies of Indiana
Law enforcement agencies of Iowa
Law enforcement agencies of Kansas
Law enforcement agencies of Kentucky
Law enforcement agencies of Louisiana
Law enforcement agencies of Maine
Law enforcement agencies of Maryland
Law enforcement agencies of Massachusetts
Law enforcement agencies of Michigan
Law enforcement agencies of Minnesota
Law enforcement agencies of Mississippi
Law enforcement agencies of Missouri
Law enforcement agencies of Montana
Law enforcement agencies of Nebraska
Law enforcement agencies of Nevada
Law enforcement agencies of New Hampshire
Law enforcement agencies of New Jersey
Law enforcement agencies of New Mexico
Law enforcement agencies of New York (state)
Law enforcement agencies of North Carolina
Law enforcement agencies of North Dakota
Law enforcement agencies of Ohio
Law enforcement agencies of Oklahoma
Law enforcement agencies of Oregon
Law enforcement agencies of Pennsylvania
Law enforcement agencies of Rhode Island
Law enforcement agencies of South Carolina
Law enforcement agencies of South Dakota
Law enforcement agencies of Tennessee
Law enforcement agencies of Texas
Law enforcement agencies of Utah
Law enforcement agencies of Vermont
Law enforcement agencies of Virginia
Law enforcement agencies of Washington (state)
Law enforcement agencies of West Virginia
Law enforcement agencies of Wisconsin
Law enforcement agencies of Wyoming

I have checked a few of the "problem" articles and this does appear to be the case, there is no state sub category available, so they were automatically put into the next highest sensible category.

Two: There is a state sub category available but it is not named in a standard way. If the template cannot find the category, it will put the article into the next highest sensible category if there is one.

Ninetyone, there is already a "state" parameter available: 

| divtype  = state
| divname  = <!-- name of the state -->

Note that if the above standard is adopted, then I will have to make some adjustments to the categorisation, to include "state" in category names, as distinct, for example from: 

| divtype  = province
| divname  = Alberta

for example.

Defuncts - yes this was an assumption I made, that defuncts are only really notable/interesting at higher levels of categorisation. If the consensus is that they should be further subcategorised then I just need to know what the world view standard is and I will make it happen.

Cheers. Peet Ern (talk) 05:02, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I know there's a state parameter, when I said add I meant use :( So how do I get this, say, out of "LEAs of California"? I think we have consensus for defuncts by state. ninety:one 13:18, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
At the moment you cannot (get this, say, out of "LEAs of California").
As soon as the above is settled, I can and will make it happen. I am holding off on changing the template to make sure I only have to do bulk work once. Please note that I welcome your initiative, because it was one of the first issues I noticed with the project. I think that we should publish the results as a project standard as soon as they are settled, and then (at the same time) I can make the template implement the project standard. Peet Ern (talk) 01:54, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

PS: I will probably have only very limited InterNet access or even no access for next three days. So if you guys can settle on and dcoument a world view compatible lea categorisation scheme, and the specific form of this for the US in the meantime, I will happily implement it as soon after the three days. Peet Ern (talk) 04:22, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Sadly I am now off on holiday for two weeks. Wonder if there will be any more catting done by the time I get back? See ya. :P ninety:one 17:14, 25 July 2008 (UTC)
I am now on holidays too, hopefully back by 19 August. I will be back into these issues then. Peet Ern (talk) 14:05, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Template:Specialist Police units of the United Kingdom

Hello

I have just made a new template, related to the project. Any suggestions/comments/opinions and the like would be appreciated, to help make it better. Thanks, Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 20:47, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem with this is that it mixes together types of unit with individual named units. – Necrothesp (talk) 13:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
i think we should drop the bottom line as it's confusing. maybe i can integrate into one of the UK LEA/police templates (but drop the WM SCS altogether) ninety:one 14:25, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Whats "WM" and "SCS"? Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 15:19, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

west midlands serious crime squad. ninety:one 16:19, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh I see, thanks. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 16:20, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

FAR Mark Felt

W. Mark Felt has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here.

My computer is dead to wikipedia,

...and may be until I get back to University, apologies! I'm sure others can help leads the project for now :) SGGH speak! 20:48, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Project standards

Folks,

I have added Wikipedia:WikiProject Law Enforcement/Project standards

Comment?

Peet Ern (talk) 07:54, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Smarten up our project's main page?

Folks,

IMHO, our project's main page looks a bit amateurish and even non wikiish !

How about something like User:Pee Tern/New WP LE main page instead ?

I have not been bold at all, just rejigged what is there now.

Cheers. Peet Ern (talk) 00:39, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Not a lot of difference in it, in my opinion. Personally I dont think the current one is as bad as you claim, but dont get me wrong - its not that I dislike your work, just I personally dont see any problem with the current one. Police,Mad,Jack (talk · contribs)☺ 12:59, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The page for me, on a couple of different computer screen sizes with different versions of IE, show the three floats at the right with the top 1/3rd of the screen blank. To me this looks rather ordinary, and not becoming of a group who claim to be specifically organised for improving Wikipedia. Yes, my suggestion is purely cosmetic, but surely looks count on our main page, first impression and all ? Peet Ern (talk) 01:48, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

This might be a nice article for your wikiproject

Contaminated currency, an article about the prevalence of cocaine and other drug contamination of paper currency, including dollars, pounds sterling and Euros. It also addresses the law enforcement activity surrounding these situations. It could use some law enforcement additions. Let me know if this might be something you might like to add. - Hexhand (talk) 07:31, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

New York City Police Department Medal for Valor

New York City Police Department Medal for Valor and New York City Police Department Medal of Valor are the same thing. I have no idea which is the correct name but they should be merged. CambridgeBayWeather Have a gorilla 00:15, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

tagged for merging. ninety:one 10:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
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