Anyone who has ever spent a significant amount of time in South Dakota before knows it's a wonderful state for so many different reasons.

We have a great quality of life, relatively low crime rate, an abundance of jobs, beautiful scenery, fresh air, great hunting, friendly people, plus we get treated to all four seasons. Winter, summer, road construction, and every once and a while, a little spring and fall.

Kinda like this year.

There is also a great deal of diversity in South Dakota as well. Everything from the rugged, throwback Old West lifestyle of western South Dakota, to the agriculture feel of the central part of the state, and of course the more business and metropolitan climate of eastern South Dakota.

All in all, South Dakota is a terrific state to put down roots and raise a family.

But, like every state, there are parts of South Dakota that are a little safer than others.

Movoto Real Estate recently conducted a study on what are the 10 safest places in South Dakota.

They created a ranking by gathering a list of the most populous places in South Dakota using a U.S. Census conducted from 2010. Then, they looked at crime data for these places. Analyzing things like, murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, theft, and vehicle theft.

From there, they divided all those crimes into four separate categories:

  • Murders
  • Violent crimes
  • Property crimes
  • Total crimes

After that, they calculated these crime rates per 100,000 residents in order to compare both large and smaller places fairly. Then, each place was given a rank with a score from one to 21 in each category. With one being the best and safest possible score.

Next, they weighted these ranking so that murders, violent crimes, and property crimes each accounted for 30 percent of the overall score and the total number of crimes accounted for 10 percent.

Finally, Movoto averaged these weighted rankings into an overall Big Deal Score, with the lowest score being the safest place.

Factoring in all that, here are the top 10 safest places to live in South Dakota according to the study:

  • The city of Brookings
  • City of Brandon
  • City of Hot Springs
  • City of Lead
  • City of Sturgis
  • City of Mobridge
  • City of Aberdeen
  • City of Tea
  • City of Canton
  • And the city of Vermillion
Brookings
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Surprisingly, the city of Brookings was ranked the safest place to live in the state, even with its 22,000 some residents it scored higher than much smaller cities like Brandon and Hot Springs.

Proving that a larger population base doesn't always mean more crime. Your chances of being a victim of a violent crime in the city of Brookings are only 1 in 467.

Conversely, on the other end of the safest places in South Dakota spectrum, the bottom three cities are Sioux Falls, Pierre, and lastly, Rapid City.

Your chances of falling victim to crime in Sioux Falls are 1 in 28. In Pierre, it's 1 in 25. And in Rapid, you have a 1 in 18 chance.

 

 

 

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