Here’s The ‘Most Dangerous City’ In Georgia

EAST POINT, GA — East Point has been dubbed the “most dangerous city” in Georgia. That’s according to the folks at the financial news and opinion site 24/7 Wall St., who dug into FBI data from 2017 to determine violent crime rates in nearly 2,000 cities and towns.

Here’s what they found for East Point:

• 2017 violent crimes per 100,000 residents: 1,307 (state: 357)
• Number of violent crimes in 2017: 467 (1.3 percent of state total)
• Poverty rate: 24.8 percent (state: 16.9 percent)
• Annual unemployment: 5.4 percent (state: 3.9 percent)

East Point’s violent crime rate of 1,307 per 100,000 is more than triple the statewide rate of 357 per 100,000, 24/7 Wall St. said. While violent crimes like robbery and rape are more common in East Point than any other city in the state, the city’s property crime rate is even more discouraging, the report said. Driven largely by larceny and burglary, there were 11,572 property crimes for every 100,000 people in the city in 2017, the highest property crime rate in the state and second highest in the nation. For reference, the national property crime rate is 2,362 per 100,000.

East Point Mayor Deana Holiday Ingraham said in an email statement that safety is and will always be a top priority in the City of East Point.

"We continue to prioritize our allocation of resources for safety and our Police Department continues to work diligently to decrease crime in the city," Holiday Ingraham said. "From 2017 to 2018, there was a 24 percent decrease in robberies. Through an innovative task force with the City of Atlanta, Georgia State Patrol and other law enforcement agencies, there has been an 80 percent decrease in car break-ins and thefts in the month of February 2019. In 2017, the City of East Point was ranked as one of the top 25 safest cities in Georgia and for the past two years, we've garnered recognition as one of the top five cities in the metro-Atlanta area for new homeowners."

POP Displays USA will soon call East Point home investing $7.9 million and creating 280 jobs, she said. Additionally, Holiday Ingraham said the equitable revitalization of the city's downtown is underway, its new City Hall will open soon and the third soccer field in the first transit soccer league in the world will soon be located in East Point's downtown through a partnership with Soccer In The Streets, MARTA and The Arthur Blank Foundation.

"As East Pointers, we rise above labels others attempt to assign to us from self-serving motives and answer to the greatness within our city and know that there's no point like East Point," Holiday Ingraham said.

In 2017, the FBI estimated there were more than 1.2 million violent crimes nationwide and an estimated 382.9 violent crimes per 100,000 inhabitants. The overall number of violent crimes was down 0.2 percent from 2016, while the overall rate fell 0.9 percent.

The FBI noted that when considering five-year trends, the 2017 estimate total estimate is actually 6.8 percent higher than 2013. Despite the increase, it was still 10.6 percent lower than 2008.

The 24/7 Wall St. rankings limited the study to cities with populations of at least 20,000. The authors noted that crime happens more often in low-income areas with fewer economic opportunities.

“The vast majority of cities on this list have higher poverty and unemployment rates than the state as a whole,” the report said.

Violent crimes include murder, nonnegligent manslaughter, rape, robbery and aggravated assault. Most states contain at least one city that has a higher violent crime rate than the country as a whole. Exceptions include Hawaii, Maine and Vermont.

Most of the cities on the list saw violent crime rates in the hundreds or mid-1000s. But some stuck out. Anniston, Alabama, for example, sees an inordinately high rate of violent crime at 3,434 per 100,000 people. That’s the highest rate in the state or any major American city “by far,” the authors wrote.

A large share of residents in Anniston are financially insecure with 20 percent of the city’s 22,000 residents living below the poverty line. The national rate is 14.6 percent.

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.