Just days after the St. Louis Cardinals won the top honor in Major League Baseball, their hometown jumped to first place on a list no one wants to lead: the most dangerous cities in the United States.
This Midwestern city has long been in the upper tiers of the annual ranking of the nation’s safest and most dangerous cities, compiled by Morgan Quitno Press. Violent crime surged nearly 20 percent there this year, when the rate of such crimes rose much faster in the Midwest than in the rest of nation, according to FBI figures released in June.
The ranking, being released Monday, came as the city was still celebrating Friday’s World Series victory at the new Busch Stadium. St. Louis has been spending millions of dollars on urban renewal even as the crime rate climbs.
Mayor Francis Slay did not return calls seeking comment Sunday.
Scott Morgan, president of Morgan Quitno Press, a private research and publishing company specializing in state and city reference books, said he was not surprised to see St. Louis top the list, since it has been among the 10 most dangerous cities for years.
Morgan said the study looks at crime only within St. Louis city limits, with a population of about 330,000. It doesn’t take into account the suburbs in St. Louis County, which has roughly 980,000 residents.
The safest city in 2005 was Brick, N.J., population about 78,000, followed by Amherst, N.Y., and Mission Viejo, Calif. The second most dangerous city was Detroit, followed by Flint, Mich., and Compton, Calif.
This is sadening for St. Loius.
I can't wait for college now, haha.
I find it saddening that you can not even spell saddening. Second of all, progress takes time if you make the government the vehicle with which to achieve it. I live close to the city of St. Louis, and no one there really seems to care. The people there feel that they should be given help, instead of trying to accomplish it on their own. Instead of doing what is necessary to advance themselves and their situation, they expect the foster care of their government. The problem doesnt lie in what the city isnt doing, but in the fact that the people within the city are too dependent on what the government has done for them in the past.