high number of sex offenders in Traverse City (Kalamazoo: moving to, live)

[jrsmama02]

We've been doing research into moving to Traverse City and until today had been seriously considering it. However, we were appalled to note on City-Data that the number of sex offendors registered to Traverse City is 129! There are 224 total in the county. I grew up in a small town surrounded by many other small towns and currenlty live in yet another small town and the numbers where I come from with populations the size of Traverse City are between 5-20 registered offenders. Even in larger 'cities' you're still only looking at less than fifty. Does anyone have any insight into this phenomenon in Michigan?

[malamute]

Originally Posted by jrsmama02

We've been doing research into moving to Traverse City and until today had been seriously considering it. However, we were appalled to note on City-Data that the number of sex offendors registered to Traverse City is 129! There are 224 total in the county. I grew up in a small town surrounded by many other small towns and currenlty live in yet another small town and the numbers where I come from with populations the size of Traverse City are between 5-20 registered offenders. Even in larger 'cities' you're still only looking at less than fifty. Does anyone have any insight into this phenomenon in Michigan?

I don't know but sometimes statistics are misleading because of different rates of prosecution and reporting.

[cardwellave]

Traverse City is by far the biggest city in the county. Of COURSE there are going to be the most sex offenders there as the most concentrated amount of people live there.

And yes there are more people to convict the people due to the nature of the concentration of people in Traverse City.

[Jswee]

Traverse City is not exactly a small town. The population of Grand Traverse Co. is about 85,000 people. I checked on the Michigan State Police Offender Website and did a search for Traverse City and it mixed addresses from all over the County and some from an adjacent County into the total for Traverse City, so I'm guessing that many of the offenders listed in city-data actually live outside of the City limits. I did a few other comparisons, Grand Traverse Co. Pop. 85,000 - 229 offenders. Wexford Co. pop - 35,000 - 128 registered offenders. Kalamazoo - Pop -78,000 - 200+ registered offenders. Seems like a pretty similar ratio around the State.

Traverse City is still a beautiful place to live and a great place to raise a family. I've lived here for 46 years and would not live anywhere else.