Is Columbus, Ohio, the 48th Most Dangerous City in America?

When you think of Ohio, you don't think of it as a hotbed of crime. Oddly enough, Ohio has seven cities in the top 50 according to the 14th Annual City Crime Rankings. Many of the cities you might expect such as Cleveland, Youngstown, Dayton, or Cincinnati. One city you wouldn't expect to see on that list is Columbus Ohio. Sadly it was ranked the 48th most dangerous city.

Is the number forty eight something to be proud of? Well not really. Being the 48th most dangerous city out of the 378 metropolitan cities ranked is quite surprising. Columbus is not known for gang wars and failing economy. In fact Columbus Ohio is quite the opposite.

While Cleveland, ranked tenth in this years poll has suffered from loss of jobs, Columbus is booming. More and more companies proudly call Columbus their National Headquarters. Take Limited Brands for one, you can't go anywhere without running into someone who works for Victoria's Secret, Bath and Body Works, or The Limited. Leslie Wexner practically owns the city with white picket fences marking his territory. This is hardly the crumbling land of lost jobs from LT V's closing.

Living in Columbus proper doesn't even have a negative ring to it. Many booming areas are situated in Columbus Proper. If you are lucky enough to call German Village, Victorian Village, or Clintonville Home then your house more then likely has a pretty hefty price tag and a loyal police department on call at all times. There are the liberal areas such as the celebrated Short North that are trendy and safe.

Still like all big cities crime does happen. According to the Associated Press, "The rankings are based on per-capita rates for homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and auto theft." This is going to happen in any city.

The sheer number of residents increases two-fold when The Ohio State University is in session. This is bound to cause an increase in minor crimes such as burglary and auto theft.

So how can Columbus improve it's ranking and move off the top fifty list? The first step is to look at the reasons why Columbus ranked so high on the list. Where are the problems stemming from? Do we need more police in certain areas of town, or more block watches? The data needs to be seriously evaluated and a game plan needs to be drawn up.

While I do not fee that this list is the end all and be all it has drawn a lot of criticism. this brings up the question of whether or not we should we even pay attention to this list? Critics of the list will be more then happy to point out that cities such as Chicago were excluded because of incomplete data. Not to mention that each of the six crimes the list is based on is given a weight. The weight of a murder to an assault is a highly subjective decision. This fact alone invalidates the list for many people.