Columbia has been ranked as one of the top 10 safest cities in the U.S. by personal finance company WalletHub, contrasting some public perceptions amid several high-profile fatal shootings in the community in the past 18 months.
The city ranked No. 8 out of 182 eligible cities in the country. Baltimore, the only other Maryland city in the rankings, placed in the bottom five for safety.
The ranking, released in October, took into account three categories: home & community safety, natural disaster risk and financial safety. The categories were then split into 41 metrics, including murder rate, theft rate, hurricane risk, unemployment rate and job security.
Columbia placed second in home and community safety, 11th in natural disaster risk and 51st in financial safety. The city earned 68.02 of the possible 100 points.
The 150 most populated cities in America were ranked, along with at least two of the most populated cities in each state. Warwick, Rhode Island, took the top spot on WalletHub’s safest community list, while New Orleans came in last.
The ranking contrasts perceptions of danger by some residents following a number of fatal shootings in the past 18 months.
Five people have been charged in the January shooting death of a 17-year-old in the Ecker’s Hollow neighborhood in East Columbia.
And police charged two teenagers this year in connection with three fatal shootings in or near the Mall in Columbia, prompting Howard County Police to begin a special mall-area patrol in April.
Emmetson Zeah, 18, is charged in a February killing of two teenagers outside the mall. His five-day trial is set for Jan. 26. After a 10-month search, William Marshall III, 17, was arrested in May and ordered held without bail in June on murder charges connected to the shooting death of another 17-year-old inside the mall’s food court in July 2024.
Despite these high-profile deaths, the crime rate in Howard County as a whole has decreased every year since 2022, according to the Maryland State Police’s crime dashboard.
Howard State’s Attorney Rich Gibson responded to the perception of danger in Columbia last month in an interview with The Baltimore Sun by saying: “I want people to know that we are not resting on our laurels. We’re not sitting back saying, ‘Oh, It’s safe here, no big deal. However, I do think you have to speak truth. … You can’t dispute the numbers, and the numbers themselves are down. Howard County is an incredibly safe space.”
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