Black Mountain among safest small cities in North Carolina

Black Mountain is among the safest small towns in North Carolina, according to an annual report from AdvisorSmith. The report ranks each city by both property and violent crimes and a composite crime score.

The town is the 23rd safest small city in the state, the report says, ahead of Woodfin (44th) and behind Fletcher (21st) in Buncombe County.

Asheville, among 17 large cities, ranks 16th.

Black Mountain experiences 5.2 violent crimes per 1,000 residents, the report says, which is below the small city average of 11.3. The town’s property crime rate was 13.1 per 1,000, lower than a 30.9 average.

Its cumulative crime score, compiled by an equation dependent on each individual crime committed, is 25.9. The statewide average is 72.

Fletcher’s crime score is 22.8, with 3.5 violent crimes and 15.3 property crimes per 1,000. Woodfin, with a crime score of 37.9, has a violent crime rate of 8.3 per 1,000 and a property crime rate of 17.7 per 1,000.

AdvisorSmith compiles its ranking from data collected from the FBI’s Uniform Data Set. To avoid outliers, the report excluded cities reporting less than two months of crime data to the FBI.

Cities were divided into three divisions in the report, with large, midsized and small, organizing areas of over 50,000 residents, between 10,000 and 50,000 residents and under 10,000 residents, respectively. In total, the report ranked 174 small, 57 midsize and 17 large cities.

For cities with less than 12 months of data reported, crime levels were scaled up to proportionally reflect a full year’s worth of crime.

Crime scores were calculated by applying a multiplier to more serious crimes such as rape, robbery, murder and assault, the report says. Multiple-weighted crimes were then added together and adjusted to reflect a proper proportion to each population.

Here's the full report: https://advisorsmith.com/data/safest-cities-in-north-carolina/.