The National Council for Home Safety and Security released their 2017 report of the  "Top 100 Safest Cities in America." While there was a lot of good news for New Jersey, some of their findings were surprising. 

Am I the only one finding it really strange that of the 700+ cities that qualified for the top 100 that Lakewood was ranked at 63? Lakewood.

Overall, New Jersey was well represented. Middletown was number 8, Jackson was at 14, Howell made it to 23 on the list, and Brick placed 56.

At this point, you're probably wondering how these rankings came to be, according to the Council:

We reviewed the most recent FBI Uniform Crime Report statistics along with our own internal research. We eliminated any cities that failed to submit a complete crime report to the FBI and removed cities with populations under 50,000. The remaining cities were ranked based on the number of reported violent crimes (aggravated assault, murder, rape, and robbery), property crimes (burglary, arson, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft), and officer count. Note that these variables were weighted, with violent crimes accounting for the majority of the total due to their severity.

Did I mention Union is apparently the 95th safest place to live in the entire country?

If you buy this report and want to reside in the safest city in the country, the National Council for Home Safety and Security ranked Thornton, Colorado number one.

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