The Greensboro City Council is supposed to have a meeting on public safety in the near future, which is appropriate because Greensboro was recently rated as the most dangerous city in North Carolina.

Best Life rates the 100 most populous cities in the country for safety based on five metrics: violent crimes per 100,000 people, pedestrian deaths per 100,000 people, natural disaster risk level, premature deaths and COVID-19 deaths per capita.

Based on those five metrics, Greensboro ranked as the 45th most dangerous city in the country. Raleigh came out the best of the cities in North Carolina ranking 97th. According to the Best Life figures, the violent crime rate for Raleigh per 100,000 people is 255.77 while for Greensboro the rate is 822.35.

Winston-Salem ranked 74th with a violent crime rate of 591.98; Durham ranked 69th with a violent crime rate of 733.35; and Charlotte ranked 60th with a violent crime rate of 788.30.

According to Best Life, along with the violent crime rating of 822.35, Greensboro had a pedestrian death rate per 100,000 people of 1.62; a natural disaster risk level of 10.2; years of life lost of 7,700; COVID deaths per 100,000 people of 39.8; for a Best Life danger index score of 31.2.

By comparison Raleigh had a Best Life danger index score of 3.6.

Greensboro didn’t rank well compared to the other cities in North Carolina but it did well compared to the city of St. Louis, which has almost exactly the same population as Greensboro. St. Louis ranked number one as the most dangerous city in the country.

The violent crimes per 100,000 people for St. Louis is 1,926.97 and the danger index score awarded by Best Life is 100. According to the St. Louis Police Department, so far this year St. Louis has had 233 murders.

Greensboro is setting a new record this year with 54 murders.