PORTLAND, Ore. — Oregon may be one of the safer states in the country, according to data released by the National Council for Home Safety and Security, but Portland is one of its most dangerous cities.
The least-safe city in the state is Coos Bay, but Portland doesn't rank far behind, coming in third from the bottom. Portland's violent crime rate is 5.2 reported crimes per 1,000 people and its property crime rate is 56.8 per 1,000.
Compare that to the safest city in Oregon, Lake Oswego, which has a violent crime rate of 0.4 per 1,000 and a property crime rate of 11.5 per 1,000.
As a state, Oregon ranks 35th in the country in violent crime and 18th in property crime.
Oregon reports 2.5 violent crimes per 1,000 people and 31.41 property crimes per 1,000, which are both well below the national average of 3.47 violent crimes per 1,000 and 40.43 property crimes per 1,000.
Here are the 10 safest cities in Oregon with violent crime and property crime rates in parentheses.
- Lake Oswego (0.4 / 11.5)
- Canby (1.5 / 12.7)
- Sherwood (0.8 / 11.7)
- Monmouth (1.3 / 12.9)
- Beaverton (1.7 / 17.8)
- Milwaukie (1.5 / 22.6)
- Silverton (1.8 / 21.5)
- Hillsboro (2.5 / 20.0)
- Hermiston (2.7 / 27.7)
- Dallas (2.9 / 20.7)
Here are the 10 least safe cities in Oregon with violent crime and property crime rates in parentheses.
- Coos Bay (3.7 / 76.1)
- Medford (4.5 / 59.6)
- Portland (5.2 / 56.8)
- Roseburg (2.4 / 56.8)
- Springfield (2.7 / 39.6)
- Gresham (3.4 / 33.0)
- Woodburn (3.3 / 33.2)
- Salem (3.8 / 42.4)
- Ashland (1.9 / 35.7)
- Eugene (3.9 / 37.3)
To identify the safest and least-safe cities in Oregon, the NCHSS used the most recent FBI Uniform Crime Report statistics. Cities that failed to submit a complete crime report to the FBI or had populations under 10,000 were excluded.
The NCHSS combined violent crime rate and property crime rate for a total crime rate variable. A second variable, police adequacy, was computed by dividing the number of total crimes by the number of police employees. Combining the total crime rate variable and the police adequacy variable created a safety score for each city.
The FBI categorizes violent crime as "murder and non-negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault," and property crime as "burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson."
Jared Cowley writes about the Trail Blazers, Portland growth, and other topcis for KGW.com. You can reach him on Twitter @jaredcowley or via email at jcowley@kgw.com.