Our crime rate is high because our official city limits are way inside of what you would think of as Springfield city limits. You'll be right in the middle of a neighborhood and there will be a "city limits" sign. Of course all of our older neighborhoods with lower owner-occupancy rates will have higher crime rates than our newer neighborhoods with higher owner-occupied rates. Our newest neighborhoods are all outside of our official city limits.

Even our "high crime" areas are not all that bad, and random violence is rare, and most victims of violent crime know the perpetrator.

I will say that it feels like rural crime rates are on the rise. I work in a surrounding county, and it feels like drugs and desperation are causing more crime than it seemed like it has in the past, but I don't have any data to back that up.