The program chosen for the present discussion is NYPD Shield, which is a counter-terrorism program that aims at preventing terrorist attacks using public support. According to the New York Police Department, NYPD Shield is a public-private partnership based on information sharing. The forecasting model that seems to be appropriate for the program is the simple moving average (SMA). It is usually used in the financial sector to smooth out price action by filtering out the “noise” from random short-term price fluctuations (Hayes). The formula for the SMA is the following:
Since the program is not new, it has accumulated a significant amount of historical data, which can be used for forecasting expenditures and outcomes. NYPD can use information about the number of prevented terrorist attacks in a year to predict future tendencies. Additionally, the data about yearly expenditures can be considered to predict the financial burden. The primary benefit of the model is its straightforwardness and high validity and reliability (Hayes). It is crucial for public agencies to have a comprehensible method for analyzing the data since they do not have the ability to hire analytics to forecast the outcomes. In summary, SMA may assist in the financial management of the program since it is a simple high-validity method that can predict the cost and impact of the program.
Work Cited
New York Police Department. “About NYPD Shield.” NYPD Shield, Web.
Hayes, Adam. “Moving Average (MA).”Investopedia. 2019, Web.