West Caldwell Makes List Of 50 ‘Safest’ New Jersey Cities

WEST CALDWELL, NJ — West Caldwell recently ranked among the top 50 “Safest Cities In New Jersey” on a 2019 report from the National Council for Home Safety and Security.

West Caldwell earned a spot at #27 on the list, which used statistics from the 2017 FBI Uniform Crime Report to reach its conclusions. The study didn’t include towns with populations less than 10,000. (See the full list and methodology here)

According to researchers, West Caldwell saw 8 “violent crimes” (0.726 per 1,000) and 66 “property crimes” (5.993 per 1,000).

The average violent crime rate in New Jersey was 1.56 per 1,000. The average property crime rate was 13.79 per 1,000, researchers stated.

The “top five safest areas in New Jersey” on the study were:

• River Vale Township
• Warren Township
• Washington Township, Morris County
• Ringwood
• Tenafly

Overall, the Garden State has “encouraging” crime statistics, researchers said.

“Income levels in New Jersey are typically considerably higher than U.S. averages,” researchers wrote. “Household average income at $80,000 is approximately a third higher and at $40,000 there is a similar margin for per capita income. New Jersey benefits from encouraging crime statistics, though inevitably there will be variations by localities.”

According to researchers:

• New Jersey is the 3rd safest state for property crime (where 1st = lowest crime)
• New Jersey has a violent crime rate that is less than half the national average (0.45 ratio) with 1.56 crimes per 1,000 against the national average of 3.47
• Compared to national averages, property crime levels are also very low at a ratio of 0.34 based upon 13.79 crimes per 1,000 which compares to the national average of 40.43

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