WHEREAS, on April 23, 1990, the President signed into law the Hate Crime Statistics Act hereafter referred to as the Act, which directs the Attorney General to acquire data about crimes which manifest evidence of prejudice based on race, religion, sexual orientation, or ethnicity; and

WHEREAS, the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP passed a resolution on October 28, 1992, endorsing the Uniform Crime Reporting Programs approach to implementing the Act and encouraging its membership to participate in its collection process; and

WHEREAS, the FBI compiles and disseminates annual Hate Crime data in its most recent report of 1994 documenting a total of 5,932 hate crime incidents, from approximately 7,356 police departments in 43 states and the District of Columbia; and

WHEREAS, data submitted to the FBI indicated that law enforcement authorities covering more than 40% of the United States population did not participate in the Act in 1994; and

WHEREAS, the IACP expects full compliance to the Act to ensure the response of the criminal justice system to hate crimes; and

WHEREAS, resolutions urging comprehensive implementation of the Act have been passed by the IACP, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National Association of Attorneys General, the National Sheriff’s Association, the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), the Association of State Uniform Reporting Programs (ASUCRP), the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training (IADLEST) and the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE); now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED, that the IACP is committed to ensuring that gains in public awareness and improved public response to hate crime continue and that the number of law enforcement agencies participating in the Act expands to full compliance; and therefore, be it

FURTHER RESOLVED, that the IACP recognizes the importance of consistent identification of all crimes which are motivated by bias/hate, and therefore urges the Uniform Crime Reporting Program to permanently continue the collection of hate crimes statistics as sub-program to its data collection and reporting process.