We now turn our focus on how Rapid City compares in terms of violent crimes and property crimes for several regional cities similar in population to Rapid City. The cities in this comparison are: Greeley, CO, Dubuque, IA, Burnsville, MN, Bismarck, ND, and Cheyenne, WY. The numbers shown above each bar reflect the number of crimes per 100,000 in population. This ratio, or crime index, is used to ensure an accurate comparison of each city’s crime incidents. To calculate this index, the city’s total number of incidents for the year is divided by its population and then multiplied by 100,000.

The first chart depicts violent crimes for each of the six cities for the year 2005. Homicides vary from a high of 7 incidents per 100,000 at Cheyenne, WY to zero incidents at Bismarck, ND. In terms of rape, Rapid City, SD far exceeded the regional cities with 93 rapes per 100,000 followed by Greeley, CO with 56 rapes down to Bismarck, ND with 14 rapes. Greeley, CO led the list in robberies with 70 followed by Rapid City with 61, Burnsville with 53, Cheyenne with 31, Dubuque with 17, and Bismarck with 14. Aggravated assaults ranged from a high of 517 incidents per 100,000 at Greeley, CO to a low of 62 incidents at Bismarck, ND. Overall lowest violent crime rates were found at Bismarck, ND followed closely by Cheyenne, WY and then Burnsville, MN.

The second chart depicts property crimes for the same six cities. The standout crime category on this chart is the Larceny-Theft rates for each of the six cities. This crime category far outstrips Burglaries and Motor Vehicle Thefts in terms of number of incidents. How high are the Larceny-Theft rates? We see Greeley, CO comes in with a high of 4498 offenses, a drop of 608 offenses compared to a couple of years ago. Cheyenne, WY is next with 4000 incidents followed by Rapid City with 3185 incidents. Bismarck, ND rounds out the list with a low of 2049 incidents. Greeley, CO also tops the list of cities with the highest burglary rate of 1333 offenses per 100,000, up 506 incidents over 2003. Rapid City is second with 738 offenses, Dubuque, IA is third with 689 followed by Cheyenne, WY, Burnsville, MN, and lastly Bismarck, ND. Finally, in terms of Motor Vehicle Thefts, Dubuque, IA had the lowest number of offenses with 114 while Greeley reported the most offenses with 520 per 100,000. Overall lowest property crime rates were found at Bismarck, ND, Burnsville, MN, and Dubuque, IA.

In this comparison, we see how Rapid City fares with the likes of several metropolitan cities including: Seattle WA, Los Angeles CA, Denver CO, Dallas TX, Chicago IL, Boston MA, New York NY, and Miami FL. Remember, the value above each bar reflects the number of incidents per 100,000 in population.

The first chart looks at violent crimes for the year 2005 and here we find the lowest Homicide rate is 3 incidents per 100,000 for Rapid City. But surprisingly, two other cities with only slightly higher rates are Seattle and New York! Rapid City also achieves a low crime rate in terms of Aggravated Assaults and Robberies with 225 incidents and 61 incidents respectively – basically unchanged from the prior two years. The next closest city in terms of Aggravated Assaults is New York with 335 incidents per 100,000 and in terms of Robberies is Denver with 253 incidents. Note that Miami is nearly off the chart in numbers of Aggravated Assaults, but it has shown a decreasing trend over the past two years going from 1200 incidents down to 1032 incidents. Miami also scores in the top 3 cities for Robberies as well, but note that its rape rate is much lower than Rapid City’s rape rate – 93 offenses per 100,000 – which leads all the large cities listed here!

The second chart compares property crimes for the year 2005 and here Rapid City does well in terms of Motor Vehicle Thefts with just 180 incidents per 100,000 (but barely above New York’s rate of 221 offenses). Seattle tops this category with 1654 offenses while Denver comes in second with 1420. Rapid City does pretty well in terms of Burglaries with 738 incidents, but once again New York is lowest with 279 offenses while Los Angeles comes in with 587 offenses – good enough for second place. Finally, our Larceny-Theft rate of 3185 puts us in fifth place behind Seattle, Miami, Dallas, and Denver reporting 4696, 4238, 3594, and 3278 incidents respectively. The “safest” places to live in terms of property crime rates turns out to be … New York and Los Angeles!!