How does the UCR Program compute agency populations?
To more accurately reflect an agency’s population, the national UCR Program has changed the methodology for estimating populations. In the past, the FBI calculated state growth rates using revised state/national population estimates from the previous year and provisional state/national population estimates provided by the U.S. Census Bureau. The FBI then estimated population figures for city and county jurisdictions by applying the state growth rate for the current year to the updated U.S. Census Bureau data. However, beginning with the 2007 edition of Crime in the United States, the FBI computed individual rates of growth from one year to the next for every city/town and county using 2000 decennial population counts and 2001 through 2006 population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. Each agency’s rates of growth were averaged; that average was then applied and added to its 2006 Census population estimate to derive the agency’s 2007 population estimate. More information on how the
