Articles
Guides and analysis of California RIPA stop data.
What is RIPA? Where does this data come from?
What is the Racial and Identity Profiling Act of 2015 (RIPA), where does the stop data on this site come from and who collects it, what are the known limitations?
Methodology: How the Metrics Are Defined
Exact definitions behind every metric on the site — race categories, what counts as a search, force, or arrest, disparity ratios, and benchmark caveats — with links to the code that computes them.
The Hit Rate
What the search hit rate measures, why it is a key disparity metric, where the outcome test comes from, and its criticisms and limitations.
Population Benchmarks
What the Stop/Pop ratio compares stops against, why residential population is a weak denominator, who criticizes it, what the RIPA Board uses, and what better benchmarks would look like.
Variable groups and schema changes
A deep dive reference for the 235 columns in the cleaned and processed statewide stops dataset -- variable groups, code tables, schema changes across years, and how columns are reconciled across eras.
About this site
Who builds and publishes this site and where to find the open-source data processing pipeline.