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Sperling's Best Places states McKinney has 89,200 people and Frisco at 64,450. Hmmm! I'm sure those stats are accurate.
Truly, I'm not surprised that Dallas ranks with Los Angeles. California ranks # 10 in the union for crime and Texas # 11.
Considering the difference in population, that really doesn't look good for us in Texas. CA has 36 1/2 million people and Texas has 23 1/2 million. People per square mile in CA ~ 217.1 and in Texas ~ 79.6.
Let's face it; it's terrible all over except those really cold states that have such little crime.
Actually, it is kind of interesting to see about crime rates, but mostly, it's quite sad to see such awful stats.
Don't assume that a published crime rate tells you anything about a city, that it has any scientific validity, or that one city's way of measuring crime is similar to another city's. LA's reported crime rate does not tell you where the good and bad neighborhoods are.
Different police departments measure crime in different ways, and the FBI says it makes no sense to compare LA's crime rate to Dallas'. It's like comparing centigrde to fahrenheit. You may know how to convert centigrade temperatures to fahrenheit, but you don't know how to convert LA's crime rate to properly compare it to Dallas' rate. The two rates are measured differently.
Besides, there is only one crime rate for LA. Does that mean that every neighborhood in LA is equally dangerous? Obviously not. In reality, your chances of violence may be 5 or 10 times more likely in a tough ghetto neighborhood than in an upscale residential neighborhood.
Some cities discourage crime reports to cover up an inefficient police department. Dallas exaggerates its crimes in order to justify more money for the police department. The new Dallas police chief is starting to clean up some of the bogus crime reports and is dropping the rate by 35%.
Auto theft is a good example. The Dallas police now require you to sign an affidavit under oath when you report your car stolen. This caused the auto theft rate to plummet. People were reporting their cars stolen to collect on insurance, after abandoning them on the street.
We talked about this before, the true measure of crime is the violent crime, not the crimes of opportunity. Every place pretty much has crimes of opportunity, but violent crime, that's where the rubber hits the road. It's hard to fudge stats on Rapes, Murders, Robberies, Homocides...but smashing a window out of a beemer and stealing someone's CD collection, I would guess those types of crimes go unreported more often than not.
Also, recall that LA has places many cops are even afraid to drive through and most citizens are terrified to report crime for fear of what may happen to them....so I'd guess there is alot that goes unreported in South Central and East LAs (both areas overrun by gangs)
As for excellent areas surrounded by some seedy ones, LA is alot like Dallas except that it has ALOT of nice/safe areas (some with their own police force) surrounded by really bad ones, not just a couple like Dallas - and I think this creates even more spill over crime. Also, in some places near the beach, you may have multi-million dollar homes, but also high crime rates; beaches - because they are public - attract all kinds of people and have alot of 'crimes of opportunity', even some violent. Why do you think those people that live on the beach in Malibu are trying to put fences around their house :-) Illegal yes, but they know there are only 11 officers assigned to cover hundreds of miles of coastline.
Don't assume that a published crime rate tells you anything about a city, that it has any scientific validity, or that one city's way of measuring crime is similar to another city's. LA's reported crime rate does not tell you where the good and bad neighborhoods are.
Different police departments measure crime in different ways, and the FBI says it makes no sense to compare LA's crime rate to Dallas'. It's like comparing centigrde to fahrenheit. You may know how to convert centigrade temperatures to fahrenheit, but you don't know how to convert LA's crime rate to properly compare it to Dallas' rate. The two rates are measured differently.
Besides, there is only one crime rate for LA. Does that mean that every neighborhood in LA is equally dangerous? Obviously not. In reality, your chances of violence may be 5 or 10 times more likely in a tough ghetto neighborhood than in an upscale residential neighborhood.
Some cities discourage crime reports to cover up an inefficient police department. Dallas exaggerates its crimes in order to justify more money for the police department. The new Dallas police chief is starting to clean up some of the bogus crime reports and is dropping the rate by 35%.
Auto theft is a good example. The Dallas police now require you to sign an affidavit under oath when you report your car stolen. This caused the auto theft rate to plummet. People were reporting their cars stolen to collect on insurance, after abandoning them on the street.
Crime statistics are all one has to go by to, at least, get a fair idea of crime in a city. I will believe these stats before I'll believe anything about a police department falsifying information about Dallas or wherever. I do not assume anything especially the possibility that L.A. is covering up crimes to make their department look better or Dallas is adding crimes to their stats to earn them more tax dollars.
Of course anyone knows there are good and bad neighborhoods within L.A., Dallas, Fresno, Houston, etc. In saying that, I, for one, would stay away from any of these cities with high crime rates. I don't have to live in such an area, and I will always choose not to do so. Houston is higher than Dallas. Are they adding crimes to earn more tax dollars as well?
Where does the FBI say one can't compare Dallas to L.A.?
This report states numbers; I don't see how numbers can differ from city to city. I fully believe it's as accurate as it can possibly be. Scientific validity has no bearing on these statistics as far as I'm concerned, at least the stats for which I'm concerned.
As socketz states, the violent crimes are the only ones of true measure. I couldn't care less if my car were stolen as long as I were not in it at the time. If I were, I believe that would be considered a violent crime if someone forced me out of it. Again, if my house were robbed, I wouldn't be happy but as long as I'm not in it, it's just a robbery, not a violent crime.
Actually, I only looked at the counts of assaults, murders, and rapes when I viewed the site. The FBI knows more than I do about crime-filled areas, so that's good enough for me.
It's hard to fudge stats on Rapes, Murders, Robberies, Homocides
I'll have to disagree with that. The distinction between murder, manslaughter and justifiable homicide is made in court, or by plea bargain, not by the police. For other violent crimes, reporting rates vary, classification and definition of crimes vary, etc. The City of Dallas is currently reworking its crime recording methods, resulting in big changes in crime rates.
The FBI website does republish the crime numbers reported by local police agencies, but they have a disclaimer that states that one police department's crime rate cannot be compared to another police department's, due to variability in data collection methods, crime reporting rates, classification of crimes, demographic differences within cities, etc. This applies to violent crimes as well as property crime.
The willingness of citizens to report muggings, rapes and assaults does vary from one jurisdiction to the next, depending on how hard or easy it is to report it, and whether citizens believe the reporting will be of any use.
The only use for the rate is to measure crime in a particular city from one year to the next... assuming the city has not changed its data collection methods.
You cannot determine whether municipal LA is more or less dangerous than municipal Dallas, just on the basis of a published crime rate.
Most of a given municipality's territory will be relatively safe... only a small portion will be truly dangerous. The 80-20 rule probably applies... 80% of the violent crimes occur in 20% of the city's territory.
Crime reports by citizens do vary. The FBI conducted its own measurement of violent crime by using statistically valid polling and sampling techniques. They had the money to do this for NYC, LA and Chicago. They found significant differences in the percentage of crimes that are actually reported among those 3 cities.
Crime statistics are all one has to go by to, at least, get a fair idea of crime in a city. .
Well,as they say... there are lies, damn lies and statistics. Actually, you cannot take a statistic at face value... you have to interpret it. And to do that, you have to understand how it is compiled, and what it is really measuring. The city of Dallas is currently changing the way the numbers are compiled and what they are measuring, and this is changing the Dallas crime rate.
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I will believe these stats before I'll believe anything about a police department falsifying information about Dallas or wherever. I do not assume anything especially the possibility that L.A. is covering up crimes to make their department look better or Dallas is adding crimes to their stats to earn them more tax dollars.
Everything that happens in a police department is subject to political pressure of one kind or another. It's naive to assume that internal bureaucratic politics does not play a part in this.
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Of course anyone knows there are good and bad neighborhoods within L.A., Dallas, Fresno, Houston, etc. In saying that, I, for one, would stay away from any of these cities with high crime rates. I don't have to live in such an area, and I will always choose not to do so. Houston is higher than Dallas. Are they adding crimes to earn more tax dollars as well?
Let's assume that the City of Richardson, a Dallas suburb, has a lower number than the City of Dallas. Are you saying that you'd sooner live in a ghetto in southeast Richardson rather than a safe and upscale neighborhood in Dallas, such as Greenway Park or Preston Hollow?
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Scientific validity has no bearing on these statistics as far as I'm concerned
Would you make a medical decision based on unscientific methods and numbers? Would you take your child's temperature with a broken thermometer?
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The FBI knows more than I do about crime-filled areas, so that's good enough for me.
No, the FBI does not independently measure crime in Dallas.
Do you work for the FBI or in one of the crime areas in a state?
Truthfully though, I need not worry because I will NEVER live in a big city again. Yes, crime in small towns is present as well, but if I ever am lucky enough to move again, I'll do some serious searching as you suggest and put my childlike ways on the shelf while doing so.
I guess in the end, we both just had completely different experiences in CA. The same thing could happen here, who knows. At this point in my life, I'm happy here and look forward to next few years. After, I'll look at it again and see if it remains the right place for me and the family.
Like I said I used to like it, and if there was anyway to live closer to LAX and live in a nice neighborhood, we would do it. Not all of us can afford to live close to work, that is just life. We too would likely stay, if traffic was not a factor. I envy you not having to deal with it. But for most of us it is a harsh reality.
MBG
I think I could make the same identical argument from the LA side.
At the end of the day, if one city has 10,000 murders recorded and another has 1000 and both are of similar size, it is pretty safe to say that one city has more murders than the other. You can split hairs for days over crime reporting procedures, but at the end of the day, Dallas has some serious crime issues as does LA. And stats like these are used by many to determine crime (few have the time to analyze crime reporting procedures and weed out individual crimes to make a more statistically accurate assessment).
To be honest, I used to drive through Compton and Watts when I lived in Riverside, and niether area feels as dangerous as the parts of Dallas around Fairpark and to the SE. That area reminds me more of the bad areas I grew up near in SE DC. In LA, you just don't see the poverty as much and it just looks like an older post World War II blue collar area...also, the homes in those LA areas are still in the 400s....vs. the 20k you can buy homes for in Dallas. What really hurts LA is the gangs....the gangs there are serious and run almost like organized crime with a chain of command, income streams, links into other profitable activity, etc. It's essentially a career path for many kids in the inner city of LA. That's really what I believe needs to be fixed in LA. I don't know the Dallas crime scene as well to comment.
Like I said I used to like it, and if there was anyway to live closer to LAX and live in a nice neighborhood, we would do it. Not all of us can afford to live close to work, that is just life. We too would likely stay, if traffic was not a factor. I envy you not having to deal with it. But for most of us it is a harsh reality.
MBG
Rancho Palos Verdes :-)
Seriously, if I had to live near an armpit like LAX, I would probably rent in one of the nice areas and simply look past home ownership for a while. 3 hour commutes each way change your life more than not owning your own home because there are a million other things to invest in, but you can never get time back....
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