Forbes Safest Cities in America - Cincinnati #9

[sirthought]

http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/26/safest-cities-ten-lifestyle-real-estate-metros-msa_chart.html

Forbes ranked America's Safest Cities. Cincinnati ranks 9th safest city in America.
This is an average of violent crime, traffic and workplace deaths, and natural disasters.

When looking at just violent crime we rank 8th safest city.

Although I feel people fear things too much in our town, I'm surprised we ranked this safe. It's good to know. I've seen other sources citing Cincinnati has a somewhat high crime rate per capita. It's a different thing, I know. I think we just get swept away sometimes by what the news wants to pump up to get more eyeballs watching.

This is a good sign that we need to build our urban core up to be stronger and safer with smart development investments that brings in more residents and businesses.

[sirthought]

That ranking above looked at crime reports from the FBI for the whole metro region. Because they looked at all metro areas equally it evens out for us.

For those who want to look at City of Cincinnati crime:
http://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/police/downloads/police_pdf5165.pdf

If I'm reading this right:
Total violent crime is down 12% year to date from last year.
It's down 16% from two years ago.

[Jumpy]

Wasn't Over the Rhine just rated the most unsafe neighborhood in America? It seems to me that one or the other (or both) are looking at their data in an incomplete manner.

Is Forbes looking solely at the total number of crimes committed and not on a per capita basis?

[Michigan Muskie]

Two things:

1) The city has never fully recovered from the riots in 2001. I used to spend many nights either working or playing downtown back then and never felt unsafe. That isolated incident produced catastrophic results, such as the closure of iconic restaurants like The Maisonette and La Normandie. I'm glad to see the city is once again considered among the safest, but Cincinnati the way I once knew it will never be the same.

2) Sirthought, 3:39 and 4:07 AM? You, my friend, are a nightest of night owls.

[blobfan]

I think that poll says more about how unsafe US cities are in general and less about how safe Cincinnati is now.

[PM Thor]

http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/26/safest-cities-ten-lifestyle-real-estate-metros-msa_chart.html

Although I feel people fear things too much in our town, I'm surprised we ranked this safe. It's good to know. I've seen other sources citing Cincinnati has a somewhat high crime rate per capita. It's a different thing, I know. I think we just get swept away sometimes by what the news wants to pump up to get more eyeballs watching.

This is a good sign that we need to build our urban core up to be stronger and safer with smart development investments that brings in more residents and businesses.

I am actually pretty shocked that Cincy rated that high. I guess I am jaded through my work, considering how much crime I get to see.

As for the news "pumping up" events, yeah, that does happen, but it's pretty shocking how little of crime/accidents/fires that the news doesn't report. If they don't get good copy, it usually doesn't run, IMO.

I HATE dayton.

[Flyer1407]

Cleveland is 10, Detroit is 12 while San Diego is 13, Austin is 15 and DC is 20? It seems that each category should be weighed rather than just adding them all up.

Having been to a lot of these cities, I must say I feel a helluva lot safer walking around San Diego than I do Detroit.

[xu95]

Wasn't Over the Rhine just rated the most unsafe neighborhood in America? It seems to me that one or the other (or both) are looking at their data in an incomplete manner.

Is Forbes looking solely at the total number of crimes committed and not on a per capita basis?

The OTR rating was for a per square mile or per capita rating, while I think this one takes into account the suburbs, etc.

xu95

[Jumpy]

Cleveland is 10, Detroit is 12 while San Diego is 13, Austin is 15 and DC is 20? It seems that each category should be weighed rather than just adding them all up.

Having been to a lot of these cities, I must say I feel a helluva lot safer walking around San Diego than I do Detroit.

I'm surprised Detroit isn't higher on the list. There's no one there to commit any crimes.

[Flyer1407]

I'm surprised Detroit isn't higher on the list. There's no one there to commit any crimes.

In Detroit's defense..even though they rank last for violent crimes they are one of the top's in the nation for workplace fatalities and traffic deaths. My guess is no workers, no one driving to work.

[kmcrawfo]

Forbes has recently been putting out some pretty wacky rankings. These seems to be another one. Read how things were actually weighted/calculated and things may seem a bit odd.

I believe they had some college rankings recently that were equally strange.

[bobbiemcgee]

I'm surprised Detroit isn't higher on the list. There's no one there to commit any crimes.

Detroit has half the population it had in the 50's. No people, no crime. Last time I was there I was on 75 @ 5:00 pm and it looked like 3:00 am.
Fond memories of La Normandie where we ate whenever somebody's parents came to town.

[blobfan]

I am actually pretty shocked that Cincy rated that high. I guess I am jaded through my work, considering how much crime I get to see.

As for the news "pumping up" events, yeah, that does happen, but it's pretty shocking how little of crime/accidents/fires that the news doesn't report. If they don't get good copy, it usually doesn't run, IMO.


That might have been the case in the past but I think it's pretty clear the Enquirer no longer has that type of filter. They seem to be copying this stuff verbatim from court dockets and police call logs. It gets comments which means views. They'll report a fart in the elevator if it gets them hits.

[nuts4xu]

Simon Leis is a great American!!

[Kahns Krazy]

That might have been the case in the past but I think it's pretty clear the Enquirer no longer has that type of filter. They seem to be copying this stuff verbatim from court dockets and police call logs. It gets comments which means views. They'll report a fart in the elevator if it gets them hits.

I have a fantastic fart-in-an-elevator story. I wonder if I should submit it as freelance work.

[sirthought]

Well the chart does show rankings weighted in the separate categories. I'm sure things like Natural Disasters and Workplace helped a lot of towns. As for the violent crime from the FBI listings, I'm pretty sure that Forbes is getting the best data available.

I'm surprised at where a lot of the cities rank too. My aunt and uncle live in Minneapolis and have stated concerns about a lot of gang activity in the city. This was about 10 years ago that this conversation happened, so maybe they've got a better handle on any crime from that. Also, a friend of mine went to Marquette and spoke of thefts and crime he experienced in Milwaukee.

The bottom line is crime happens everywhere. The more people you bunch together it's likely to be reported and acted on.

Detroit metro is double the size of Cincinnati, and you can see that violent crime there is considerably higher, while we have more trouble driving. San Diego has a lot more violent crime than Cincinnati, but also gets hit with more natural disasters.

I'm in Downtown and OTR all the time and never have any problems. OTR does have crime, but I recently ran an event there that brought out 15,000 people of all ages/class walking up and down the streets. The police said we didn't have one issue for the event's 3 days. To stay away is just fatalism.

I'm surprised to see all the cities ranking higher than us across the board, like Indy, St. Louis and Columbus. Wouldn't think Indy would rate so much worse than Chicago in violent crime and natural disasters.

[xeus]

This is a good sign that we need to build our urban core up to be stronger and safer with smart development investments that brings in more residents and businesses.

What's the urban core and why is that a bigger priority than our neighborhoods?

[West is Best]

San Diego has a lot more violent crime than Cincinnati, but also gets hit with more natural disasters.

San Diego has very low violent crime rate, it averages 40-50 homicides a year and has a much larger population than Cincinnati. The overall city is pretty wealthy and city limits stretch pretty far into the suburbs, so there's no way it could have a higher crime rate than Cincy. These numbers seem fudged.


Personally, I think Cincy deserves some good press from Forbes, even if its fudged, for being such a reliably conservative metro area. He's should be promoting Cincy as a destination city like Newsweek promotes Austin.

[Kahns Krazy]

What's the urban core and why is that a bigger priority than our neighborhoods?

Ask Detroit.

[xeus]

Ask Detroit.

I'm asking about Cincinnati. If you want to answer my question by way of analogy that's fine. But "Ask Detroit" doesn't really answer my question.