The National Council for Home Safety and Security (NCHSS) released a nation-wide ranking of the safest cities, putting Baton Rouge in the top 25 for Louisiana.

The Safest Cities Report examines each city’s per-capita crime data to provide state rankings and simultaneously features cities that have made strides to improve or sustain a safe environment for their residents.

Baton Rouge with a population of 224,790 ranked 23 out of 32. According to the NCHSS rankings, the violent crime count in Baton Rouge is currently 2,067, non-violent crime, 11,965.

Separated from New Orleans by Lake Ponchartrain, Mandeville is removed from the violence plaguing its neighbor across the lake. A low violent crime rate of 1.29 per 1,000, along with a property crime rate below the national level.

Safety in St. Tammany Parish continues as Covington earns the second spot on the list. The violent crime rate is nearly half of the statewide rate as well as a slightly below-average level of property crime.

The third safest city in Louisiana is Minden in Webster Parish and the fourth is Gretna in Jefferson Parish.

The NCHSS identifies the safest cities by reviewing FBI Uniform Crime Report statistics. Cities with a population below 10,000 and/or cities that failed to submit a complete crime report to the FBI were eliminated from the report. See the full methodology here.