If Cincinnati City Council members vote as expected today to outlaw racial profiling, police officers will start next week on a massive data collection project.

        The ordinance will require officers to record, among other details, the race of any drivers stopped on Cincinnati streets. But police administrators plan to collect much more than that — including the races of every person with whom officers have any investigative-type contact, a number that officials say might easily top 1 million.

        “If you want to collect data, you might as well have it so that you can benefit from it,” Lt. Col. Ron Twitty said. “We're ready to go.”

        Officers might write down the race, gender and age, he said, of anyone they arrest, anyone they stop on foot or in a car, anyone to whom they issue a traffic ticket, as well as anyone they come into contact with on a call for service. Calls for service alone hover around 300,000 a year.

        In some scenarios, officers will have to decide whether a card should be completed, Chief Tom Streicher said. The process will evolve as officers get used to it and discover questions.

        “This will create a tremendously huge intelligence database for us,” he said. “We want our process to be all-encompassing.”

        The division has designed new cards for officers to record the information on, the chief said, and is looking for a computer software system to keep and analyze the data as well as applying for grants to pay for it. Some race data is collected now, such as on arrest forms, but those forms are filed, not kept in a compatible database, Col. Twitty said.

        Fraternal Order of Police President Keith Fangman called recording the information on paper “archaic” and said officers already feel overburdened by paperwork.

        The ordinance will be voted on at council's meeting this afternoon. Councilman Phil Heimlich said he plans to ask that the measure be divided into two pieces — a ban he supports on racial profiling, or targeting people because of their skin color; and data collection, which he calls a “complete waste” and says sends an unacceptable message that Cincinnati cops are racist.

        Committee Chairman John Cranley, however, said Tuesday he remained convinced he has the five votes needed to pass the ordinance as written.

        Council members Paul Booth, Minette Cooper, Alicia Reece, Pat DeWine and Jim Tarbell have supported it already; Mayor Charlie Luken has been a vocal supporter. Councilman Chris Monzel abstained Monday, saying he wanted more information.

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