Should we show a break-in / vehicle-crime-risk layer at all? #1

Posing this openly rather than deciding it alone, because I think it's a genuinely hard tradeoff, not just an engineering question. Full write-up: ETHICS.md

The question: should Chalked show a break-in/vehicle-crime-risk layer at all, alongside the parking-rule data?

The case for it: it's a genuinely useful, real consideration — outside our own house we've had multiple cars broken into and a catalytic converter stolen, on a street with fewer parking restrictions than most nearby blocks, which makes it more legally convenient to park there and, in our real experience, a spot we're hesitant to use anyway. "Where can I legally park" and "where would I actually feel okay parking" are different questions. The underlying crime data is already public in most cities — this would just be surfacing it in a useful context.

The case against it: recorded crime data reflects reporting/enforcement intensity, which correlates with neighborhood demographics in ways that don't track actual risk — a naive "risk" layer built on raw incident counts could reinforce exactly the kind of neighborhood stigma and bias this shouldn't want any part of. Other "neighborhood safety" apps have taken real, warranted criticism for this. Raw counts are also just statistically misleading without normalizing for density.

Currently: paused, not built, not on the near-term roadmap. If it happens at all, some candidate middle grounds worth weighing here rather than deciding solo: per-capita normalization instead of raw counts, scoped specifically to vehicle break-ins rather than general crime, a coarse area-level signal rather than precise block mapping, opt-in/off-by-default, and explicit visible caveats wherever it's shown.

Genuinely want opinions here — including "don't build this at all."