Is St. Louis really a dangerous city?

 

 

By: Peter Lewis

 

 

 

Since 2000, the city of St. Louis has gotten progressively “worse” from a crime standpoint and has developed easily one of the worst reputations in the country.  The city reached a low point last year when Forbes rated it as the second most violent city in America, behind Detroit and ahead of Oakland.  However, some lists differ; US News rated St. Louis number one, neighborhoodscout.com rated St. Louis number eight, and buisnessinsider.com rated the city at number seven.  Obviously, from these rankings St. Louis is still among the top in the country, but many other lists differ significantly. Some rate St. Louis in the top five, where others go as low as the twenties, which begs the question, “How bad is St. Louis?”  

Well, isn’t as easy as you would guess.  Many lists (that decide how “bad” a city is) have very different criteria, which can cause confusion as to where exactly St. Louis ranks.  Some lists only go by violent crimes and some combine both violent crime and property crime.  Also, another problem is the area looked at in particular.  When many hear of St. Louis, they most likely think about the metro area, but not the surrounding areas, like St. Louis County.  Yet, many lists include not only the metro area of a city, but its surrounding areas as well.  East St. Louis, which is on the Illinois side of the river and has a large percent of the crime that the city of St. Louis has been known to have, is ranked with St. Louis on some lists, which adds to the amount of crime reported.  While it may seem like the city is violent, there are a lot of misconceptions.

For starters, the city of St. Louis is a county all to itself, with St. Louis County surrounding it.  The St. Louis City itself is pretty typical when it comes to crime; it does have its rough areas, but, for the most part, is one of the better metro areas in the United States.  While crime may be present in the neighborhoods, the downtown area, with Busch Stadium, The Arch Grounds, and Keener Plaza are relatively safe.  Of all US metro areas, St. Louis would be ranked between the safest and the middle.  As nation.time.com reported, in 2012, St. Louis City crime fell 12.4% in all overall crime, with murder and theft decreasing in the city itself.  Compared to other metropolitan areas in America, St. Louis City did very well in 2012, as other cities saw increases in crime.  St. Louis County has seen decreases since its peak in 2006 as well, showing the region is improving for the better.

Don’t get me wrong, St. Louis has problems, but they’re not as bad as its reputation may suggest. Many organizations and people have come out even to dismiss these lists, such as The American Society of Criminology statement in 2011, which said, “Such rankings are invalid, damaging and irresponsible. City crime rankings make no one safer, but they can harm the cities they tarnish and divert attention from the individual and community characteristics that elevate crime in all cities.” Co-editor of CQ Press, Scott Morgan, in 2006 dismissed not only his publication’s list, but other lists on crime evaluation saying, “I am stunned if there is a criminologist out there who would support this.” 

As CQ Press reported, the city of St. Louis has the nineteenth most populated metro area in the US, but the city on its own would have the ninety-first ranking, far from even being considered a bad city.  Even with that the city’s reputation is better than expected.  The lists that say a city is dangerous or not have a glaring problem: the lists put violent and property crime together, so a city with high property crime but low violent crime can still be high on the list, as in the case of St. Louis City.  Now, don’t get me wrong, crime is crime, but the stigma that these rankings would classify a city as a place where your personal safety and life could be on the line is completely unreasonable. 

Most people reading this have been to St. Louis City numerous times, even at night. Have you ever felt like your life was at risk? A Gallup poll reported that 74% of St. Louisans felt safe while walking the street at night, making St. Louis the fourteenth city on the list out of the fifty most populous cities in the country.  Making a better case for St. Louis, it seems some lists create boundaries to even things out.  For example, Chicago’s area is clearly defined and is much worse than St. Louis could ever be, but St. Louis County is added to St. Louis City to make the creators of the lists lives easier so they don’t have to do much work. From all this, it’s easy to see St. Louis City has problems like any other city in the world. However, it’s far from being a city where your life is on the line constantly.