Community Policing Data Act

Effective July 1, 2021, Virginia Community Policing Act data will be made publicly available on the Virginia Open Data Portal website .

The 2020 session of the General Assembly passed a bill to amend the Code of Virginia by adding in and amending several Code sections (§§ 9.2-191, 15.2-1609.10, 15.2-1722.1, 52-30.1 through 52-30.4) relating to the Community Policing Act; data collection and reporting requirements. Additional updates to the Community Policing Act will take place July 1, 2021 per Chapter 37 of 2020 Special Session I.

Under the current Community Policing Act, each time a law-enforcement officer or State Police officer stops an Individual or Driver of a motor vehicle, such officer shall collect the following data based on the officer's observation or information provided to the officer by the Individual or Driver:

• (i) the race, ethnicity, age, gender of the person stopped, and whether the person stopped spoke English;
• (ii) the reason for the stop;
• (iii) the location of the stop;
• (iv) whether a warning, written citation, or summons was issued or whether any person was arrested;
• (v) if a warning, written citation, or summons was issued or an arrest was made, the warning provided, violation charged, or crime charged;
• (vi) whether the vehicle or any person was searched; and
• (vii) whether the law-enforcement officer or State Police officer used physical force against any person and whether any person used physical force against any officers.

In addition to stop information, each state and local law-enforcement agency shall collect the number of complaints the agency receives alleging the use of excessive force.