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.
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
CT City Population Violent
crimeProperty
crimeLaw enforcement
employeesTotal 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
51 North Haven 23703 13 524 60 537 22.66 0.55 22.11 2.53
52 Farmington 25602 14 555 62 569 22.22 0.55 21.68 2.42
53 New London 26995 122 568 85 690 25.56 4.52 21.04 3.15
54 Ansonia 18751 25 442 55 467 24.91 1.33 23.57 2.93
55 Stratford 52472 53 1080 114 1133 21.59 1.01 20.58 2.17
56 Manchester 57884 101 1275 151 1376 23.77 1.74 22.03 2.61
57 Bridgeport 146819 945 2833 445 3778 25.73 6.44 19.30 3.03
58 Clinton 12917 2 323 36 325 25.16 0.15 25.01 2.79
59 East Haven 28805 21 593 57 614 21.32 0.73 20.59 1.98
60 Hamden 61234 205 1168 133 1373 22.42 3.35 19.07 2.17
61 East Hartford 50184 117 1206 150 1323 26.36 2.33 24.03 2.99
62 Derby 12535 38 291 36 329 26.25 3.03 23.21 2.87
63 West Haven 54738 105 1175 117 1280 23.38 1.92 21.47 2.14
64 Trumbull 36167 46 850 85 896 24.77 1.27 23.50 2.35
65 Meriden 59792 215 1216 131 1431 23.93 3.60 20.34 2.19
66 Watertown 21631 21 491 46 512 23.67 0.97 22.70 2.13
67 Orange 14002 7 465 55 472 33.71 0.50 33.21 3.93
68 Bloomfield 21541 60 573 61 633 29.39 2.79 26.60 2.83
69 Newington 30382 21 780 66 801 26.36 0.69 25.67 2.17
70 East Windsor 11425 17 362 37 379 33.17 1.49 31.68 3.24
71 Plainville 17701 34 509 47 543 30.68 1.92 28.76 2.66
72 West Hartford 63085 45 1742 142 1787 28.33 0.71 27.61 2.25
73 New Britain 72630 310 2014 169 2324 32.00 4.27 27.73 2.33
74 Hartford 123117 1313 4435 425 5748 46.69 10.66 36.02 3.45
75 New Haven 131181 1105 5111 460 6216 47.38 8.42 38.96 3.51
76 Waterbury 108378 481 4252 315 4733 43.67 4.44 39.23 2.91
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.
