Editor's Note: This article has been update for 2019. This is our fifth time rankings the safest places to live in Rhode Island.
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Do we think there's a direct correlation between educated residents, jobs, competitive salaries, and people flocking to the safest places in Rhode Island to live the Little Rhody dream? Absolutely.
Whether you're hanging out on a beach in Newport, noshing on a lobster roll at the Providence Seafood Festival, taking a ride on the Flying Horse Carousel in Westerly, Rhode Island knows how to keep its residents safe.
And here at HomeSnacks, we wanted to know just how safe is Rhode Island? More importantly, where, exactly, are the safest cities in The Ocean State? So, we consulted the numbers. In total, we analyzed 35 cities with over 5,000 residents. We looked at important factors like property crimes and violent crimes per capita for 35 places.
We discovered that if you choose to live in one of Rhode Island's safest places, you'll get to experience some of New England's best chowdah' and some of the northeast's warmest hospitality. Heck, there's a reason Rhode Island notables like Peter Griffin, Pauly D, and David Hartman have been singing the praises of places like Quahog, Cranston, and Pawtucket for years: these are not only some of the best places in the country, they are some of Rhode Island's safest.
So, where are these amazing places in Rhode Island where crime is low, jobs are plentiful, and neighborhoods are safe? Read on.
Here are the 10 safest places to live in Rhode Island for 2019:
All lobstah' rolls and crazy Pawtucket Red Sox fans aside, Rhode Island is the 13th oldest state in the country, so we're not at all surprised that they are the eighth safest state in the country: they've had some time to perfect their safety standards. And, folks, that's just what the Rhode Island places on our top ten safest places to live list have done.
So, what city is the safest place to live in Rhode Island for 2019? Well, according to the most recent FBI data we crunched, Glocester is the safest place to live in The Ocean State.
Check out the rest of our not so naughty, very safe Rhode Island cities to see how your city ranked. And if you don't find your favorite there, head to the bottom.
For more reading on safe places to live in and around Rhode Island, check out:
Population: 10,108 Rank Last Year: 1 (No Change) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 29 (1st safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 326 (1st safest) More on Glocester:
Population: 30,823 Rank Last Year: 7 (Up 3) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 45 (5th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 639 (7th safest) More on South Kingstown:
5. Cumberland
Source: Public domain
Population: 34,973 Rank Last Year: 17 (Up 12) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 42 (4th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 769 (10th safest) More on Cumberland:
6. Bristol
Source: Public domain
Population: 22,255 Rank Last Year: 11 (Up 4) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 67 (14th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 435 (3rd safest) More on Bristol:
Population: 6,167 Rank Last Year: 9 (Up 2) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 32 (2nd safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,037 (15th safest) More on West Greenwich:
Population: 17,381 Rank Last Year: 12 (Up 5) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 63 (11th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 586 (6th safest) More on Portsmouth:
9. East Greenwich
Source: Public domain
Population: 13,139 Rank Last Year: 6 (Down 3) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 45 (6th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 1,035 (14th safest) More on East Greenwich:
Population: 16,307 Rank Last Year: 5 (Down 5) Violent Crimes Per 100k: 61 (10th safest) Property Crimes Per 100k: 778 (11th safest) More on Barrington:
How we calculated the safest cities in Rhode Island for 2019
While there are surveys and public polls on what cities in a state are the safest, we didn't want to rely on speculation and opinion. Instead, we looked at the hard numbers from the FBI's most recent report of crime (Sept 2018) in Rhode Island.
Specifically, we analyzed the FBI's Uniform Crime Report which summarizes the number of property crimes and violent crimes in each city per year. We used two criteria:
Violent crimes per capita (murders, assaults, rapes, armed robberies)
Property crimes per capita (thefts, burglaries, motor vehicle thefts)
For example, there were a total of 36 crimes committed in Glocester which had a reported population of 10,108. That means the number of crimes per capita is 0.0036 which translates into a 1 in 280 chance of being the victim of a crime.
We only looked at cities that have populations of more than 5,000 people reported to the FBI in 2017. This left us with a total of 35 of the biggest cities in Rhode Island to rank.
We ranked each city for each criteria from 1 to 35 where 1 in any particular category is the safest.
Next, we averaged each places two criteria to create a Safety Index. We crowned the place with the lowest overall Safety Score "The Safest Place In Rhode Island".
The safest city, based on our criteria, is Glocester. The most dangerous city in Rhode Island? Providence, where residents had a 1 in 26 chance of being the victim of a crime.
Note: This report is not an analysis of the effectiveness of local police departments, nor does it reflect the fact that people from out of town may come into a community and cause a crime. It simply looks at where crimes occurred most frequently, based on a city's population.
There You Have It - The Safest Cities In The Ocean State
Looking at the data, you can tell that Glocester is as safe as they come, according to science and data.
But as most Rhode Island residents would agree, almost every place here has its safe and not safe parts. So just make sure you're informed ahead of time.