SafeWise, a Salt Lake City online resource "that offers safety solutions, information, and recommendations for your home and community," stated in a March 9 press release, "The SafeWise Team is pleased to release the sixth annual Safest Cities report... for 2020."

According to SafeWise, "Taneytown moved up one spot from last year’s ranking to become the safest city in Maryland, with no counts of violent crime reported." Last year, Taneytown was rated as the second safest city in Maryland.

Taneytown Councilman Joe Vigliotti told the News-Journal, "We are usually in the top ten, and for the last several years, have been in the top few spots (usually second place)."

"This is an extraordinary accomplishment made possible by an amazing department and an amazing community of resident. Our police are good people who value professionalism and service, and who take their work and the residents they protect very seriously," Vigliotti said.

It shows how warmly residents respond to our officers, either in their daily lives or at large events. Our police are very much a part of what makes this place home.

"For Taneytown, this ranking matters tremendously," he stated. "It means having a safe community for families and schools. It means businesses can focus on serving visitors and succeeding. It means that this is a place worth living in and working in. It means that the American promise, the American dream, is still very much possible."

The councilman noted, "This is also, in part, the success of Taneytown residents. Their votes and choices in elections have translated into sound policies and decisions, which help support an excellent police force capable of doing great things."

In their press release, SafeWise noted, "Maryland has a higher violent crime rate (4.7) than the national average (3.7), but the safest cities are well below. Ninety-percent kept violent crime down to fewer than 2.0 incidents per 1,000."

Placing fifth in the 2020 list, it was not Thurmont's first time either in making the top ten. Thurmont Economic Development Manager, Vickie Grinder, said Thurmont was rated fifth in 2019, third in 2018, seventh in 2017, ninth in 2016, and second in 2015.

"This type of ranking affects the quality-of-life advantages for any town, for not only attracting new businesses, but new residents as well," Grinder said, adding, "This indicator most certainly makes the community more attractive to both of those segments, but also for a business to decide to expand. A safe town-ranking is critical to a sustainable town, and the Thurmont Police Department continues to deliver that environment year after year."

The top ten Maryland's safest cities named by SafeWise included, by ranking, (1) Taneytown, (2) Ocean Pines, (3) Hampstead, (4) Mount Airy, (5) Thurmont, (6) Centreville, (7) Glenarden, (8) District Heights, (9) Bowie, (10) Brunswick.