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Community Profiles User Guide

Contents

Getting Started

Selecting Your Area

2.1. Boundary Types

2.2. Options for Selecting an Area

2.2.1. Click Map to Select

2.2.2. Draw to Select

2.2.3. Select from List

2.3. Find Address

Building Dashboards

Adding Data

Using Cards

Using Maps

Using Tables

2. Selecting Your Area

In Community Profiles, the first step is to choose the area you’d like to learn about. You can choose from many types of areas, and you can choose using a few different tools.

2.1. Boundary Types

When you first load Community Profiles, the map shows census tracts by default. Even if you’re unfamiliar with tracts, these are a great option because

  • They allow you to focus on a small, neighborhood-level geography, and
  • Most data is available at this level for most years.

We offer 15 boundary types in all, so there may be something that works better for you.

Change Your Boundary Type

Use the “Choose a Boundary” panel to choose a new boundary type. Scroll through the list from left to right and click the boundary type you want to use.

Boundary Options

There are 15 different boundary types you can use to select your area.

  • Census block groups
  • Census tracts
  • Townships
  • Counties
  • ZIP Codes
  • IndyVitals Neighborhoods
  • GINI Neighborhoods
  • Marion County Health Planning Areas
  • Public Safety Focus Areas
  • Small DMD Neighborhoods
  • Medium DMD Neighborhoods
  • Large DMD Neighborhoods
  • School Corporations
  • State House Districts
  • State Senate Districts

2.2. Options for Selecting an Area

There are three tools to select an area for your profile: click to select, draw to select, or select from list. You can switch between selection modes selecting each pane.

2.2.1. Click Map to Select

The quickest way to select your area is to click boundaries on the map. We’ll highlight the areas you selected, and when you create a profile, we’ll combine the data for all those areas.

2.2.2. Draw to Select

Click “Draw to Select” to open the drawing tools menu. Now choose a drawing tool. You can choose to draw a radius around a point, draw a radius around a line, or draw a polygon.
Radius Around Point

To draw a radius, select the radius tool and then click a point on a map. We’ll draw a one-mile radius around that point and select the geographies that are substantially inside that radius. Move the radius slider to shrink or grow your radius. You can set the radius to 1/4 mile, 1/2 mile, 1 mile, 2 miles, and 5 miles.

Radius Around Line

To draw a radius around a line, select the line tool and click the map to start the line. Keep clicking on the map to add new points to your line, and finally click the last point again to finish the line.

We’ll draw a one-mile radius around this line and select all the boundaries that significantly overlap with the radius. Use the radius slider to change the size of the radius.

Custom Polygon

Draw a polygon by selecting the polygon tool and clicking on the map define all the points in the polygon. Click the first point again to finish the shape. We’ll select all the boundaries that are substantially covered by your shape.

Editing Your Selection

After using the draw tools, you may want to add or remove some areas from your selection. Just choose “Click to Select” again to select or un-select areas.

2.2.3. Select from List

If you need to select something by name, rather than from the map, you can use the list. Open the list by click “Choose from list”. Now select one or more items from this. They will also show as highlighted on the map. Similarly, when you select areas from the map, they will appear selected in the list.

2.3. Find Address

You can search for an address with the find an address box. Search for an address and hit enter. We will drop a pin at that address. This can be a good reference point if you want select areas near a specific place, or if you want to get your bearings in the map.