Crime is higher than you’d expect in Kansas, in light of its image as a modest, down-to-earth midwestern state. The state’s violent crime increased by 10.9% in 2018, and its violent crime and property rates are both higher than national averages. That said, the situation in Kansas’ safest cities stands in contrast to that of the state at large. Each of the state’s 5 safest cities logged crime rates below state and national levels in both major categories.
McPherson is Kansas’ safest city. The county seat of the county sharing its name, McPherson has a rich history dating back to the mid 19th century, and is home to two colleges. Additionally, the city has remarkably low crime: its violent crime rate of 1.74 per 1,000 is well below half of the statewide rate, while its property crime rate is less than 10% of national levels.
#2 Leawood recorded equally low crime rates in 2018. The Kansas City suburb of 35,000 earned the state’s lowest rate of violent crime, a remarkable 0.77 per 1,000. While Leawood’s property crime rate is not quite as low, it is nevertheless below state and nationwide levels.
Kansas’ 3rd safest city is Lenexa, which, with a population topping 54K, is the largest city in the top 5. The city is notable as the birthplace of tech giant Garwin, and recorded impressive crime rates for a city its size, including a violent crime rate less-than-half of the statewide rate.
There’s a slight uptick in violent crime between Lenexa and the following two entries on the list, however, #4 Lansing still performed well in 2018. The small Leavenworth County city managed to earn a violent crime rate 57% of the statewide rate, while its property crime is well below half of the statewide level.
Closing out the list is Gardner (#5), the 3rd Johnson County city in the top 5. Gardner recorded respectable violent and property crime rates just a notch higher than those of Lansing, the preceding entry on the list.
Kansas’ Safest Cities
KS 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 McPherson 13211 23 22 37 45 3.41 1.74 1.67 2.80
2 Leawood 35070 27 543 81 570 16.25 0.77 15.48 2.31
3 Lenexa 54349 107 838 130 945 17.39 1.97 15.42 2.39
4 Lansing 12043 30 136 18 166 13.78 2.49 11.29 1.49
5 Gardner 21945 56 308 39 364 16.59 2.55 14.04 1.78
6 Emporia 24698 28 429 50 457 18.50 1.13 17.37 2.02
7 Olathe 139154 305 1957 211 2262 16.26 2.19 14.06 1.52
8 Shawnee 65983 165 1076 114 1241 18.81 2.50 16.31 1.73
9 Derby 23842 37 505 55 542 22.73 1.55 21.18 2.31
10 Garden City 26902 123 608 76 731 27.17 4.57 22.60 2.83
11 Dodge City 27756 90 592 58 682 24.57 3.24 21.33 2.09
12 Overland Park 193877 440 3739 295 4179 21.55 2.27 19.29 1.52
13 Haysville 11343 46 283 28 329 29.00 4.06 24.95 2.47
14 Ottawa 12300 63 313 32 376 30.57 5.12 25.45 2.60
15 Atchison 10589 43 269 24 312 29.46 4.06 25.40 2.27
16 El Dorado 12960 28 383 25 411 31.71 2.16 29.55 1.93
17 Newton 18830 131 560 42 691 36.70 6.96 29.74 2.23
18 Leavenworth 36331 345 1130 76 1475 40.60 9.50 31.10 2.09
19 Hutchinson 40573 166 1624 97 1790 44.12 4.09 40.03 2.39
20 Great Bend 15251 112 577 37 689 45.18 7.34 37.83 2.43
21 Arkansas City 11791 50 510 29 560 47.49 4.24 43.25 2.46
22 Topeka 126399 766 6560 324 7326 57.96 6.06 51.90 2.56
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.
