The city of St. Petersburg is now sporting a new title.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.- St. Petersburg has been named the best-managed city in Florida, according to a new report.
Though it is the best-managed city in Florida, St. Petersburg ranked just 48th out of 150 major U.S. cities. Boise and Nampa of Idaho received the top national honors in WalletHub’s “Best-Run Cities in America.”
The list was unveiled this week by WalletHub, a Washington, D.C. based personal finance site. The list compared the country’s 150 largest cities based on six factors: financial stability, education, health, safety, economy, and infrastructure and pollution.
St. Petersburg was able to hold its own in the economy and infrastructure categories, but it took a nose dive in the safety category. The city was among one of the cities with the worst crime ranking, according to the report.
Violent-crime per capita, property-crime rates and the number of fatalities per 100,000 residents were looked at when it came to the safety score.
areavibes listed St. Petersburg violent crime rate at 1,021 per 100,000. Miami’s violent crime rate was fairly close to that, it was listed at 1,198 per 100,000. The website also listed the chances of being a victim of a violent crime in Miami are 1 in 84 while those same chances are 1 in 98 in St. Petersburg.
Ben Kirby, a spokesperson for St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman, said he was not sure the saftey numbers reflected properly of the city while the financial rankings did. He believes crime statistics are down in St. Petersburg, but that this kind of thing takes long-term planning, hopefully by next year the numbers will be better.
But still, St. Petersburg residents should be happy. Despite the bad safety rankings the city beat out Tampa, Hialeah, Tallahassee, Orlando, Fort Lauderdale and Miami. All of those major cities were ranked in the bottom 50.
The beach city also beat mighty Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Manchester, New Hampshire. Those two cities came in at 49th and 50th.
