ValuePenguin, a personal finance website that conducts in-depth research and analysis on a variety of topics, has published a report on the Safest Places in New York State. The report is based on 2014 FBI data, the last full year of data available at the time they prepared the report (the company intends a follow up report on 2016 data).
To produce their list, ValuePenguin researchers analyzed 210 places with populations of more than 5,000. The crime scores ranged from 16 to 5,266. Small towns and villages dominated the top five safest places. To rank places, they collected data from the 2014 FBI crime statistics by city, which provided the then-most recent crime data available. Not every town participates in this report and they also excluded towns with fewer than 5,000 residents because towns with small populations are more sensitive to crime score fluctuations for fewer crimes committed. The raw data report included property crimes (burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson), and violent crimes (murder/manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault) from all law enforcement agencies that chose to participate in the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting program. Woodbury Town was not included because the FBI suspected underreported data. Plattsburgh was not included because they did not report data in 2014.
ValuePenguin standardized the data to reflect violent and property crimes per 100,000, to account for population. Then, they aggregated a “crime score” by weighting violent crime at 80% and property crime at 20%. Though property crime is more prevalent, they figured that violent crime is more concerning to residents. The crime score was adjusted for population size, lowering the score for larger cities. Using the crime score number, 210 municipalities throughout New York State were ranked based on their crime scores. Towns that may be familiar to readers such as South Salem or Katonah are not listed because they are hamlets within larger towns which are listed.
Statewide, out of the 210 municipalities ranked by ValuePenguin, four Westchester communities ranked among the Top 10 Safest in New York (crime score in parentheses).
Irvington ranked #9 (128), Briarcliff Manor ranked #7 (121), Pleasantville ranked #4 (59) and Lewisboro ranked #1 (16). Harrison (#20/236), Bronxville (#13/196) and Rye (#12/184) rounded out the Top 20.
No municipalities in Westchester ranked among the Top 20 least safest in New York.
The Top 5 least safest municipalities in Westchester, based on statewide rankings, are Mount Vernon ranked #184 (2,113), Yonkers ranked #161 (1,561), White Plains ranked #139 (1,202), New Rochelle ranked #137 (1,182), and Port Chester ranked #135 (1,154).
We broke down the list by Population Size where Small is between 5,000 and 9,999, Mid-Size is between 10,000 and 19,999 and Large is over 20,000.
The Safest Small Municipalities in Westchester are Pleasantville #1, Briarcliff Manor #2, Irvington #3, Bronxville #4, and Croton-on-Hudson #5.
The Safest Mid-Size Municipalities in Westchester are Lewisboro #1, Rye #2, North Castle #3, Bedford #4, and Scarsdale #5.
The Safest Large Municipalities in Westchester are Harrison #1, Yorktown #2, Mount Pleasant #3, Peekskill #4, and Ossining #5.
Westchester Municipalities ranked solely by crime score is as follows:
RankMunicipality
- 1 Lewisboro
- 2 Pleasantville
- 3 Briarcliff Manor
- 4 Irvington
- 5 Rye
- 6 Bronxville
- 7 Harrison
- 8 North Castle
- 9 Croton-on-Hudson
- 10 Hastings-on-Hudson
- 11 Tuckahoe
- 12 Bedford
- 13 Scarsdale
- 14 Yorktown
- 15 Sleepy Hollow
- 16 Eastchester
- 17 Pound Ridge
- 18 Tarrytown
- 19 Dobbs Ferry
- 20 Mount Pleasant
- 21 Mamaroneck Town
- 22 Rye Brook
- 23 Pelham
- 24 Mamaroneck Village
- 25 Larchmont
- 26 Peekskil
- 27 Ossining
- 28 Mount Kisco Village
- 29 Greenburgh Town
- 30 Pelham Manor
- 31 Port Chester
- 32 New Rochelle
- 33 White Plains
- 34 Yonkers
- 35 Mount Vernon
Read the entire ValuePenguin report here.
