say what!?

Safer Cities::
"MR. BLUMSTEIN: Crime rates in the US have been violent crime rates particularly, and homicide in particular, which is the best measure of crime, has been coming down rather steadily since it peaked in 1991. We are now at a level of homicide that we haven't seen since the mid-1960s, all of which is good news.

MR. NNAMDI: And what are the breakdowns in that decrease in the overall crime rate? Are property crimes also falling?

MR. BLUMSTEIN: Property crimes are also falling, but the violent crimes are the ones that trouble most people, and violent crimes being measured best as homicides and robberies, and both are following a very similar path, coming down in the order of 5 to 10 percent a year. But this decrease obviously can't continue indefinitely, and we're starting to see a flattening out at least in the larger cities, which are the ones that started down first, in part because the largest cities were the ones that started up first in the mid-1980s, largely a consequence of the growth of crack markets and the violence associated with those, and the presence of guns, particularly in young people's hands. I think it's important to note that the entire growth of the late 80s, which peaked in 1991, was attributable to young people using handguns, in terms of homicides.

MR. NNAMDI: Jeremy Travis, your take on these statistics?

MR. TRAVIS: Well, it's important to recognize that this is in some ways the best of times in a long time in this country in terms of overall crime rates, and as Al Blumstein points out, the sharp decline in violent crime and homicides that we've seen in this decade is particularly welcome, and that has been experienced in large cities and in poor neighborhoods particularly.