DeKalb Police Map 'Hopefully' Back Up By Monday

UPDATE: [11:45am] DeKalb County residents will be able to follow crime reports in their communities again – hopefully by Monday, a county police department spokeswoman said Friday morning.

The DeKalb County Police Department is upgrading their police report system, and the process has temporarily shut down their ability to update their account with CrimeMapping.com, which allows residents to track where and when crimes are reported to police countywide, said Mekka Parish, the department's spokeswoman.

That process has taken longer than anticpated, but the department hopes everything will be updated by Monday, she said.

FIRST POST: [5:30am] Will DeKalb County residents no longer be able to keep track of crime in their communities?

I looked this morning at the county's account on CrimeMapping.com, which allows the DeKalb County Police Department to post a brief notice about each reported crime where and when it happens.

Unfortunately, the map was blank. It says the last posted crime was on July 12.

I've put a call into the department's media line to get answers about what happened. It's been a critical tool – if not the only tool – for reporting about crime in the North Druid Hills-Briarcliff area. And this is an area that didn't benefit from any sustained crime coverage until North Druid Hills-Briarcliff Patch arrived in 2010. Almost 100 percent of the crime stories you've read on this site have started with me first seeing it posted to the map.

I've also run into a number of people and community leaders who use the map to keep track of what's going on in their own neighborhoods.

So, answers to come today (hopefully).

Let us know what you think about the county's use of CrimeMapping.com in the comments section below.