In 1991, homicide was the 10th leading cause of death in the United States. That year, there were 24,703 murders in the U.S., contributing to the highest violent crime rate in decades. Since the early 90s, violent crime has declined nearly every year. In 2014, there were only 14,249 murders in the country.
Violent crime is a broad category that includes rape, robbery, aggravated assault, and murder. While these crimes have become less and less common nationwide, some metro areas have experienced a dramatic spike. In San Luis Obispo, California, the violent crime increased from 267 reported incidents per 100,000 people in 2010 to 421 incidents per 100,000 people in 2014. Based on figures published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, these are the metropolitan areas with the greatest increases in violent crime.
A dramatic uptick in the prevalence of violent crime over a five year period does not necessarily mean that a city is especially dangerous. Four of the 10 cities with the highest five-year increases still have a lower violent crime rate than the national rate of 366 incidents per 100,000 people. Green Bay, Wisconsin, had the third fastest increase, yet with only 219 violent crimes for every 100,000 residents, it is still a relatively safe city.
Click here to see the 10 cities where crime is soaring.
Click here to see the 10 cities where crime is plummeting.
In an interview with 24/7 Wall St., John Roman, senior fellow at the Urban Institute, said, “Wealth tends to make people risk averse, and that would cause violence to decline.” In eight of the 10 cities with the fastest climbing violent crime rates, a typical household earns less than the national median of $53,657. In Hanford-Corcoran, California, where crime has spiked by nearly 30%, 26.6% of city residents live in poverty, one of the highest poverty rates in the country.
Some cities are likely experiencing a rise in crime due to policy that may have hurt an area’s ability to fight and address crime. According to Roman, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has slashed public expenditures. This has translated to “fewer police, fewer dispatchers, fewer classes coming out of the training academy, fewer parole and probation agents [as well as] fewer, and less well-trained correctional officers, and fewer services for returning prisoners. And at the end of the day, all of that adds up.” Two of the five cities with rapidly increasing crime rates are in Wisconsin.
Based on figures published by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report, 24/7 Wall St. identified the 10 metropolitan statistical areas where crime rates rose the most from 2010 to 2014, the most recent available year of data. In order to be considered, areas had to retain the same geographic boundaries during the period covered, and they had to retain consistent reporting practices. Additionally, we reviewed annual unemployment figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) for 2010 and 2014. We also considered data from the Census Bureau’s 2014 American Community Survey on household income, educational attainment rates, and poverty.
These are the 10 U.S. cities where violent crime is soaring.
10. Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 27.2%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 377.5
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 480.0
Total murders (2014): 7
The Waterloo-Cedar Falls metro area is significantly more dangerous than Iowa as a whole. While there were 273.5 violent crimes per 100,000 state residents, there were roughly 480 violent crimes for every 100,000 metro area residents. The city fares worse than the state as a whole by several economic measures as well. In Waterloo-Cedar Falls, 12.9% of residents live below the poverty line, a slightly higher share than the statewide 12.2% poverty rate. Additionally, with an unemployment rate of 4.9%, a larger share of the metro area workforce is out of a job than the 4.4% of the state’s workforce.
Violent crime has shot up by over 27% in the five years since 2010 in the metro area. While there were 629 reported incidents of violent crime in 2010, by 2014 there were more than 800 violent crimes. A spike in the number of rapes and aggravated assaults primarily accounted for the increased crime rate.
9. Alexandria, LA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 27.3%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 638.0
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 812.1
Total murders (2014): 10
Louisiana’s violent crime rate of 515 incidents per 100,000 residents is far higher than the nationwide crime rate of 366 incidents per 100,000 Americans. One of the most violent states in the country, Louisiana is home to Alexandria, one of the most violent cities in the country. The violent crime rate in Alexandria of roughly 812 incidents per 100,000 residents is the highest of any major city in the country after only Anchorage.
While it is now one of the most violent cities in the country, Alexandria was a slightly safer city five years prior. In 2010, 638 violent crimes were reported per 100,000 in the metro area. Since then, violent crime has spiked by 27.3%.
24/7 Wall St.8. Williamsport, PA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 29.7%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 168.2
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 218.2
Total murders (2014): 4
Violent crime in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, was nearly 30% higher in 2014 compared to 2010. The number of aggravated assaults, the most common form of violent crime, jumped from 100 in 2010 to 133 in 2014. While the violent crime rate increased dramatically in those five years, the property crime rate actually dropped. Nonviolent crimes, such as larceny and burglary, decreased by 4.5% over the same time period.
Though the violent crime rate in Williamsport has risen since 2010 by more than in only a handful of other U.S. metros, it is not an especially dangerous city. While there were roughly 366 violent crimes across the country for every 100,000 people in 2014, there were only 218 incidents for every 100,000 people in Williamsport.
7. Hanford-Corcoran, CA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 29.9%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 353.7
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 459.6
Total murders (2014): 7
The Hanford-Corcoran metro area was safer than the nation as a whole five years ago. Now, it is considerably more dangerous. In 2010, there were 354 violent crimes per 100,000 people in the area when the national violent crime rate was roughly 405 incidents per 100,000 people. While the national violent crime rate has since declined, violent crime has surged by nearly 30% in Hanford-Corcoran. The 2014 violent crime rate of 460 incidents per 100,000 metro area residents is higher than the 366 violent crimes per 100,000 people nationally.
According to Roman, wealthy people are more risk-averse and less likely to commit crimes than those with little or no income. In Hanford-Corcoran, 26.6% of residents live below the poverty line, a larger share than in all but a handful of other U.S. metro areas.
6. Grand Junction, CO
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 31.3%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 265.8
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 349.1
Total murders (2014): 3
Though Grand junction was once considerably safer than the country as a whole, the city’s violent crime rate has shot up by 31.3% over the past five years and is now roughly in line with the national rate. There were only 266 violent crimes for every 100,000 metro area residents in 2010 compared to the nationwide violent crime rate that year of 405 per 100,000 people. Now, the annual violent crime rate in Grand Junction is 349 incidents per 100,000 people, only slightly lower than the national rate of 366 incidents per 100,000 people. Rapes and aggravated assaults were the biggest contributors to the area’s rising violent crime rate. There were only three murders in Grand Junction in 2010 and in 2014. In Rocky Mount, North Carolina, which has roughly the same population as Grand Junction, there were 19 murders in 2014.
5. Madera, CA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 33.8%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 432.3
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 578.3
Total murders (2014): 9
The violent crime rate shot up nearly 34% between 2010 and 2014 in the Madera metro area. Unlike most of the cities with spiking violent crime rates, the incidents of certain violent crimes actually declined. Though the population grew by roughly 2,300 people between 2010 and 2014, the number of reported murders, rapes, and robberies decreased. The reported number of aggravated assaults, however, drove the overall increase in violent crime, which shot up from a total of 466 assaults in 2010 to 742 in 2014. Madera’s aggravated assault rate of roughly 483 incidents for every 100,000 residents is higher than the rate in all but a handful of U.S. metro areas and considerably higher than the corresponding national rate of 233 incidents per 100,000 people.
4. Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, WI
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 36.6%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 464.1
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 634.0
Total murders (2014): 99
Milwaukee is one of the largest metro areas in the country, and also one of the most dangerous. In the last five years, the incidence of violent crime has soared by 36.6% to its current level of 634 incidents for every 100,000 residents. Though there was one fewer murder in the metro area in 2014 than in 2010, the number of reported rapes nearly doubled, and aggravated assaults became far more common, increasing from 232 incidents to 343 for every 100,000 people.
Focusing on reducing wasteful government spending, Governor Scott Walker has slashed budgets in Wisconsin. According to Roman, this has led a decrease in the number of police and correctional officers, as well as lowered the quality of training and cut the “kinds of services and programs … available to help people turn their lives around.” Milwaukee is one of two Wisconsin metro areas with a rapidly climbing crime rate.
3. Green Bay, WI
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 39.2%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 157.2
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 218.8
Total murders (2014): 3
In places with low levels of violent crime to begin with, even slight increases in the number of incidents can have a dramatic impact on the overall violent crime rate. Despite a 39.2% spike in the violent crime rate over the past five years, Green Bay is still an especially safe city. The city’s violent crime rate of 219 incidents per 100,000 people is well below the national violent crime rate of 366 incidents per 100,000 people and Wisconsin’s violent crime rate of 290 incidents for every 100,000 residents. As was the case in nearly all cities with increasing crime rates, a spike in the number of aggravated assaults was the primary cause of the city’s surging violent crime rate.
2. Sioux Falls, SD
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 41.4%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 231.7
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 327.6
Total murders (2014): 4
Sioux Falls is one of only two U.S. metro areas where the violent crime rate has surged by more than 40% over the five years since 2010. The number of people who call Sioux Falls home increased by roughly 5,000 between 2010 and 2014. The number of reported rapes, robberies, aggravated assaults, and murders also increased, but disproportionately faster than the population’s growth. Despite the spike in violent offenses, the crime rate in Sioux Falls is slightly lower than the national rate of 366 incident per 100,000 and roughly in line with South Dakota’s violent crime rate.
1. San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles-Arroyo Grande, CA
5-year increase in violent crime rate: 57.8%
Violent crime per 100,000 (2010): 266.8
Violent crime per 100,000 (2014): 420.9
Total murders (2014): 3
The violent crime rate in the San Luis Obispo metro area has shot up by nearly 58% since 2010, far and away the sharpest increase of any U.S. metro area. In 2010, San Luis Obispo was once much safer than the country as a whole, but became considerably more dangerous by 2014. In 2010, only 267 violent crimes were reported in the metro area for every 100,000 people, far less than the corresponding national rate of 405 reported incidents per 100,000 people that year. The city’s current violent crime rate of 421 incidents for every 100,000 people is much higher than the national rate of 366 incidents per 100,000 people. Meanwhile, only about 30 miles away, violent crime in the Santa Maria metro area decreased by 35%, one of the most precipitous drops in the country.
Click here to see the 10 cities where crime is plummeting.
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