Longboat: Florida’s safest small city

Longboat Key Police Chief Pete Cumming wasn’t surprised when the Key was recently named the safest small city in Florida by insurance website ValuePenguin.

After all, the Key is an affluent barrier island with an older population. Still, nailing down why the crime rate remains so low is difficult.

“It’s the chicken-or-the-egg theory,” Cumming said “Do we have a low crime rate because we’re doing such a good job, or are we doing such a good job because we have such a low crime rate? I think it’s a combination of both.”

ValuePenguin classifies small cities as having a population between 5,000 and 15,000. For cities of all sizes, the website ranked the Key No. 4 for safety.

So how does Key crime break down?

So far this year, police have responded to 3,085 calls, ranging from animal problems to vandalism and disturbances. That’s an increase of about 1% over the first six months of 2015.

But that increase isn’t exactly the result of a crime wave.

There’s been a 136% jump in calls for boating issues and an increase of more than 300% in code enforcement calls, according to the town’s crime statistics.

The police department added a second vessel to its fleet, which explains the rise in number of boating calls.

As for code enforcement?

The rise is “likely due to the turtle ordinance activity concerning lighting and disorientations,” said Cumming, who believes recent changes to the town’s ordinance increased awareness of turtle-related issues.

The high-profile package thefts that occurred in the spring, as well as some boat burglaries, have pushed the combined theft and burglary incidents up 63% compared with the same period last year. The latter category also includes residential and commercial break-ins, but Cumming said those are rare on the island.

Although there were five instances of stolen supplies, global positioning systems and motors, all taken from boats, the last time a vessel was stolen was more than a year ago.

“When someone is looking to steal GPSs, they see a boat, climb on board, unscrew the thing and take it,” Cumming said.

Unlike in a motor vehicle, there’s no easy way to hide valuables on a boat, although outdoor cameras offer some protection.

“You can go to Best Buy and pick up a set of outdoor cameras for a couple hundred bucks,” Cumming said. “And at least then we would have a lead to follow up on.”

The number of calls about suspicious individuals, circumstances or vehicles on the Key rose 158% to 103 compared with the first six months of 2015.

Town Manager Dave Bullock sees the island’s residents as its most valubale crime-stopping weapon.

“Depending on the population, we have anywhere between 7,000 to 22,000 observers who are really eager to report anything that looks unusual,” Bullock said. “And that’s hugely helpful.”