The safest place to live in South Carolina? This ranks as the state’s No. 1 town
A growing South Carolina town was named the state’s safest place to call home.
Fort Mill, in York County, ranks No. 1 on a list of smaller cities where residents face lower crime rates and lower financial impacts from crime, according to results published Dec. 18.
To create the list of safest places to live, personal finance website MoneyGeek said it studied more than 1,000 towns across the country. Using FBI crime data from 2022, the most recent year available, the website focused on cities with 30,000 to 100,000 residents. The results were divided into four categories: violent crime rate, property crime rate, crime cost per capita and total crime costs.
“Crime takes a toll on communities — not just emotionally but also economically,” MoneyGeek wrote in its report. “In addition to direct costs from loss of property, services for victims and policing and corrections, residents of higher-crime locales often pay higher rates on car insurance, homeowners insurance and renters insurance.”
What makes Fort Mill safe?
Fort Mill topped the list after it was found to have the lowest crime-related costs among the South Carolina cities considered. It also boasted the lowest violent crime rate, though it got edged out when it came to property crimes, such as burglary and theft.
The town — located near Rock Hill and roughly 20 miles south of uptown Charlotte — said it got its name from a “colonial-era fort built by the British and a grist mill on nearby Steele Creek.” Today, the town is in the midst of a decade of growth and is home to about 31,000 people, according to its website and the U.S. Census Bureau.
“Fort Mill broke the 30,000-resident mark in the newest estimate,” The Herald reported in May. “It’s also top five nationally by one growth indicator, for cities and towns its size.”
When Fort Mill’s safety was compared to over 1,000 towns across the nation, it landed in the No. 57 spot. That put the town just behind the highest-ranked place in neighboring North Carolina, the Raleigh suburb Fuquay-Varina.
So, where did other smaller cities in South Carolina land in the national rankings from MoneyGeek? The other five places on the list were closer to the coast or Greenville:
- Mount Pleasant at No. 179
- Bluffton at No. 317
- Greer at No. 334
- Goose Creek at No. 614
Overall, MoneyGeek said the nation’s safest smaller city was Monroe Township, New Jersey, roughly 45 miles from New York City. The lowest-ranked place — at No. 1,010 — was Monroe, Louisiana, about 100 miles east of Shreveport.
This story was originally published December 22, 2023 at 11:59 AM with the headline "The safest place to live in South Carolina? This ranks as the state’s No. 1 town."
