Why is Our Crime Rate Higher Than Our Neighbors?

In anticipation of the review of the OC Sheriff Department (OCSD) contract with the City at last week’s Council meeting I happened to look at the “Police Services” section of the City website and find this in the message from the Chief –

“Lake Forest Police Services’ personnel are second to none…”

Hmmm.

“…second to none…” he said.

RECENT REPORTS

During the City Council meeting one last week of the speakers in the public comment portion of the meeting spoke about her recent experience with the Police. She had a robbery of some significant paintings and it looks like the investigators botched it up, amongst other things telling her to clean up before anyone had taken prints. She was upset with the speed and quality of the response. I asked the Chief to follow-up, but it looks like the trail will be cold unless the burglars are caught elsewhere.

“…second to none…” Hmmm.

A little later in the meeting it was time to discuss the renewal of the OCSD contract, which I wrote about earlier last week (Click Here ). During the public comment section, another resident got up and spoke about seeing 4 police officers having breakfast together. He even took pictures! Apparently this isn’t the first time he’s complained about this process.

“…second to none…” Hmmm.

UTILIZATION OF STAFF

During the meeting, I observed two Police officers standing around at the back of the meeting. This year Lake Forest will spend thousands of dollars having extra police officers standing around during council meetings. The Chief has even ordered plain clothes police to sit down and pretend to be residents, all of this on the taxpayers dime while the Police get overtime. At one time or another I’ve been to almost every City Council meeting in Orange County, and never saw so many police officers standing around at a Council meeting as I do in Lake Forest. In fact, I rarely see more than a single officer, the Chief. In our case we have 2 or more police at every meeting and sometimes nearly a half dozen.

HIGHEST CRIME RATE

When the contract came up for review I asked the Chief “Why does Lake Forest have the highest crime rate of any of our neighbors?” If you doubt what I’m saying, read the staff report, some of which I’ve excerpted here. The figures below are for crime rate per 1,000 residents for the 5 cities from 20121 through 2015 that (a) are closest to us and (b) are patrolled by OCSD. Laguna Hills is not included here as the staff report neglected to include Laguna Hills in all 4 years.

2012

• · RSM - 7.08
• · Laguna Woods – 9.16
• · Aliso Viejo – 9.35
• · Laguna Niguel – 12.6
• · Mission Viejo – 13.35
• · LAKE FOREST – 15.15

2013

• · RSM – 6.26
• · Aliso Viejo – 6.86
• · Laguna Woods – 8.38
• · Laguna Niguel – 10.51
• · Mission Viejo – 11.10
• · LAKE FOREST – 11.58

2014

• · RSM – 4.64
• · Aliso Viejo – 6.08
• · Laguna Woods – 7.52
• · Mission Viejo – 9.63
• · Laguna Niguel – 9.64
• · LAKE FOREST – 9.86

2015

• · RSM – 7.0
• · Aliso Viejo – 7.8
• · Laguna Woods – 8.8
• · Laguna Niguel – 11.78
• · Mission Viejo – 12.13
• · LAKE FOREST – 12.75

Note a few things -

• · Every year for the past 4 years we’ve had the highest crime rate
• · Every year for the past 4 years RSM had the lowest crime rate
• · Aliso Viejo and Laguna Woods are #2 and #3 consistently
• · Laguna Niguel and Mission Viejo are #4 and #5 consistently.
• · Every year we are #6.

If you look at the mean performance over these 4 years, you can see that the crime rate in Lake Forest is

• · nearly twice as high as RSM.
• · 63% higher than Aliso Viejo
• · 45% higher than Laguna Woods
• · 10% higher than Laguna Niguel
• · 7% higher than Mission Viejo

Having a higher crime rate than Mission Viejo is an anomaly, since cities with higher populations (MV has 97,124 compared to Lake Forest which is only 79,748) almost always have higher crime rates. This is why RSM and Aliso Viejo (both 50,000) have lower crime rates than Laguna Niguel (65,000) and Lake Forest (79,748). So the anomaly of a much bigger city (Mission Viejo) having a lower crime rate instead of a higher one, is startling. To find this anomaly for the past 4 years means something is going on beyond mere happenstance.

This data is for Part 1 crimes only. That’s murder, rape, aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, larceny, arson, and motor vehicle theft. But there are many more crimes, referred to as Part 2 crimes, and many of these are also troubling. Here’s an index of the rank order for Lake Forest and our neighbors (as well as 466 California cities) based on all crimes -

• · Laguna Woods #2
• · RSM - #6
• · Aliso Viejo - #12
• · Laguna Niguel - #13
• · Mission Viejo - #23
• · LAKE FOREST - #35

Once again, Lake Forest is the worst. The good news is that out of 466 California cities we had a pretty good result - #35. But once again, all of our neighbors did better.

Public safety is Job #1 for a City, so having the highest crime rate of any of our neighbors disturbs me. It’s not that our crime rate is so high that we need to barricade our homes, and people who live in South Central LA would love to have a crime rate as low as ours. Yet nonetheless we are the highest among any of our neighbors, and no one can give me an explanation.

Let’s talk about that in our next article.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner is on the City Council for Lake Forest. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook and you can share your thoughts about the City at Lake Forest Town Square on Facebook. His comments are not meant to reflect official City Policy.

Dr. Gardner has office hours every Tuesday from 4 pm to 6 pm at the City Hall. In addition, he holds a Town Hall meeting every quarter. The next meeting will be on August 13 at 2 pm at the Foothill Ranch Public Library.