Safest Cities in Connecticut – 2021

Last Updated on December 27, 2020

Crime–particularly violent crime–is low in Connecticut: the state’s violent crime rate of 2.07 offenses per 1,000 people is just 56% of the nationwide rate. It should serve as no surprise, then, that crime rates in the Nutmeg State’s safest cities are among the lowest in the United States.

Crime rate per 1,000

Law enforcement per 1,000

Connecticut’s safest community is Ridgefield, a Fairfield County town of 25K located at the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains. Ridgefield logged just a single violent crime in 2018, and had a property crime rate of 2.53 per 1,000. With such low crime, it’s fair to say that Ridgefield is one of the safest places in America.

#2 Ledyard is not far behind. The town, home of Foxwoods Resort Casino, logged a violent crime rate of 0.54 per 1,000 in 2018.

The 3rd safest community in Connecticut is Old Saybrook, a town just over 10,000 in Middlesex County. Old Saybrook’s crime figures are very similar to those of the preceding entry on the list, though the city had slightly lower violent crime and slightly higher property crime than Ledyard.

Connecticut’s #4 spot belongs to New Canaan, a wealthy town which at one point had the highest median family income in the nation. In 2018, New Canaan earned the state’s lowest violent crime rate (an honor it shares with Madison) due to the fact that no violent crimes were reported in the town during the year.

Newtown, another mid-sized Fairfield County town, earns the 5th position on the list. The town’s crime rates are, in many cases, more impressive than those of preceding entries, but Newton drops a couple of positions solely due to its low ratio of law enforcement-to-residents.

Connecticut’s Safest Cities

Show entries

CT	City	Population	Violent crime	Property crime	Law enforcement employees	Total crimes	Crime rate per 1,000	Violent crimes per 1,000	Property crimes per 1,000	Law enforcement per 1,000
1	Ridgefield	25260	1	64	46	65	2.57	0.04	2.53	1.82
2	Ledyard	14808	8	52	30	60	4.05	0.54	3.51	2.03
3	Old Saybrook	10117	5	48	29	53	5.24	0.49	4.74	2.87
4	New Canaan	20461	0	101	50	101	4.94	0.00	4.94	2.44
5	Newtown	28015	6	122	48	128	4.57	0.21	4.35	1.71
6	Monroe	19653	10	105	55	115	5.85	0.51	5.34	2.80
7	Greenwich	63075	6	396	178	402	6.37	0.10	6.28	2.82
8	Suffield	15688	2	77	24	79	5.04	0.13	4.91	1.53
9	East Lyme	18744	8	88	28	96	5.12	0.43	4.69	1.49
10	Madison	18184	0	111	38	111	6.10	0.00	6.10	2.09
11	Simsbury	25164	5	150	45	155	6.16	0.20	5.96	1.79
12	Bethel	19974	4	144	46	148	7.41	0.20	7.21	2.30
13	Canton	10298	1	70	20	71	6.89	0.10	6.80	1.94
14	Granby	11367	3	79	21	82	7.21	0.26	6.95	1.85
15	Plainfield	15049	22	74	21	96	6.38	1.46	4.92	1.40
16	Stonington	18602	13	164	50	177	9.52	0.70	8.82	2.69
17	Brookfield	17230	5	158	44	163	9.46	0.29	9.17	2.55
18	Cheshire	29337	5	244	58	249	8.49	0.17	8.32	1.98
19	Shelton	41657	23	286	60	309	7.42	0.55	6.87	1.44
20	Coventry	12438	10	90	21	100	8.04	0.80	7.24	1.69
21	East Hampton	12893	11	87	18	98	7.60	0.85	6.75	1.40
22	Seymour	16589	10	153	39	163	9.83	0.60	9.22	2.35
23	Avon	18379	4	186	41	190	10.34	0.22	10.12	2.23
24	Darien	22050	4	259	61	263	11.93	0.18	11.75	2.77
25	New Milford	26956	20	263	57	283	10.50	0.74	9.76	2.11
26	North Branford	14179	9	146	29	155	10.93	0.63	10.30	2.05
27	Middletown	46314	36	584	127	620	13.39	0.78	12.61	2.74
28	Plymouth	11646	11	151	31	162	13.91	0.94	12.97	2.66
29	Rocky Hill	20163	6	265	50	271	13.44	0.30	13.14	2.48
30	Groton Town	29372	37	383	79	420	14.30	1.26	13.04	2.69
31	Berlin	20593	15	281	54	296	14.37	0.73	13.65	2.62
32	Vernon	29304	21	367	61	388	13.24	0.72	12.52	2.08
33	Glastonbury	34593	20	456	76	476	13.76	0.58	13.18	2.20
34	Wallingford	44680	30	597	93	627	14.03	0.67	13.36	2.08
35	Norwich	39318	108	498	96	606	15.41	2.75	12.67	2.44
36	South Windsor	25968	14	358	54	372	14.33	0.54	13.79	2.08
37	Guilford	22268	11	320	46	331	14.86	0.49	14.37	2.07
38	Enfield	44574	55	687	106	742	16.65	1.23	15.41	2.38
39	Waterford	18937	11	329	50	340	17.95	0.58	17.37	2.64
40	Bristol	60184	62	970	144	1032	17.15	1.03	16.12	2.39
41	Torrington	34286	46	564	87	610	17.79	1.34	16.45	2.54
42	Danbury	85818	133	1163	150	1296	15.10	1.55	13.55	1.75
43	Naugatuck	31400	26	502	68	528	16.82	0.83	15.99	2.17
44	Branford	28121	17	476	66	493	17.53	0.60	16.93	2.35
45	Norwalk	89442	252	1347	213	1599	17.88	2.82	15.06	2.38
46	Stamford	132007	218	2120	304	2338	17.71	1.65	16.06	2.30
47	Cromwell	13950	7	251	35	258	18.49	0.50	17.99	2.51
48	Fairfield	62452	34	955	111	989	15.84	0.54	15.29	1.78
49	Southington	43960	32	734	87	766	17.42	0.73	16.70	1.98
50	Milford	54754	37	1119	126	1156	21.11	0.68	20.44	2.30

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Methodology

To identify the safest cities, we reviewed the most recent FBI Uniform Crime Report statistics. We eliminated any cities that failed to submit a complete crime report to the FBI and cities with populations under 10,000. This left 3,381 cities (out of a total of 9,251).

There are two broad classifications of crimes: violent crimes and non-violent crimes. According to the FBI, “Violent crime is composed of four offenses: murder and non-negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. Violent crimes are defined in the UCR Program as those offenses that involve force or threat of force. Property crime includes the offenses of burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson. The object of the theft-type offenses is the taking of money or property, but there is no force or threat of force against the victims. ”

We computed the total number of crimes reported by each city by adding violent crimes and property crimes. We then created a crime rate as the number of crimes per 1,000 population. Then we transformed the total crime rate variable so that the skewness was reduced and normalized.

Data from 2,831 law enforcement agencies was then collected to determine police adequacy (TotalCrimes / Number of police employees). We consider that the smaller the police adequacy statistic is, the safer the city is. This variable was also transformed and normalized.

Finally, the two variables were combined to create a safety score for each city.

Safest Cities in Connecticut – 2021

Connecticut’s Safest Cities

Methodology

Information

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