Port: We must rely on data, not perception, to address crime in North Dakota

MINOT — The most important thing our government does is count things.

You might be thinking that’s wrong; that it’s really law enforcement, or the military, but you’re wrong. It’s counting. Governing means making policy — criminal justice policy, foreign policy, infrastructure policy, budget policy — but good data is a prerequisite for good policy.

The greatest societies in history — the Romans, the British, the Chinese, etc. — were built on the back of an expansive and effective bureaucracy. The term “mandarin,” which is a sometimes derisive, somewhat archaic slang term for a government functionary, comes from the Chinese, who used it to describe their rigorously trained scholar bureaucrats.

Which brings us to the question of crime in North Dakota. Statistics, in this, are vital. The p