McCandless, PA has a A safety grade (83/100) with a violent crime rate of 109 per 100,000, 69% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · mid-size city
McCandless (28,350 people) sits in the mid-size municipal band. This page opens with per-100,000 FBI UCR rates, then PA and national benchmarks.
Data updated 2026-09-05
McCandless, PA is close to the national middle for violent crime, and earns an A PlainCrime safety grade, where violent crime runs 69% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, McCandless, PA shows violent crime at 109.3 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 694.9 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 69% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade A from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
2020–2024 direction
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 3.6 per 100,000 in 2020 to 109.3 in 2024 (+2978.2%). The highest observed value was 109.3 in 2024 and the lowest 3.6 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Comparable rate records
The nearest comparable 2024 records to McCandless's 109.3 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Lower Saucon Township (109.1), Shillington (109.9), Luzerne (109.9), Lower Pottsgrove Township (108.6). These are same-year agency submissions that pass the same completeness screen, not a claim that the cities have identical conditions. They make the cohort position above checkable against named records instead of a generic state average.
Position in the state cohort
At 109.3 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, McCandless ranks 292 of 838 — above 546 of the 837 other Pennsylvania cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +67.4% against the cohort median of 65.3. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft is 95.4% of reported property offenses in McCandless, against a cohort median of 85.8%. The remainder is burglary (6) and motor vehicle theft (3). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Offense mix
Violent offenses are 13.6% of the 228 Part I offenses reported in McCandless for 2024, against a median of 10.0% across comparable Pennsylvania cities — a gap of 3.6 points. Offense mix is shaped by which agencies report and how incidents are classified as well as by the underlying offenses, so it describes the reported record rather than a settled difference in conditions.
Property counts dominate McCandless's FBI UCR Table 8 municipal row. Per-100,000 rates use the reporting-year population on that row; cities that fail the completeness test stay out of rate rankings. A citywide figure rarely describes any single neighbourhood inside the municipal boundary.
Mid-size municipal totals above are reported offenses, not safety advice for any single block. Reporting completeness still varies by year and agency.
Across 16.5 Census sq mi, McCandless logged 11.9 property and 1.9 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
McCandless's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (82% of 228 offenses; mix index 6,981).
Violent offenses are only 14% of the municipal total - a property-led book.
McCandless offense mix (2024)
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (16.5 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
| Offense | Count | Rate /100K |
|---|---|---|
| Property Crime | 197 | 694.9 |
| Larceny-Theft | 188 | 663.1 |
| Burglary | 6 | 21.2 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 3 | 10.6 |
| Arson | 0 | 0 |
| Violent Crime | 31 | 109.3 |
| Aggravated Assault | 30 | 105.8 |
| Rape | 1 | 3.5 |
| Murder | 0 | 0 |
| Robbery | 0 | 0 |
The chart omits 2021 rather than drawing an unsupported zero or partial-coverage dip. The table preserves the year and marks the gap.
Lead series · rose across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Secondary series · rose · 2020-2024 · FBI UCR
| Year | Coverage | Population | Violent Rate | Property Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Comparable | 28,151 | 3.6 | 557.7 |
| 2021 | Insufficient reporting | 27,934 | - | - |
| 2022 | Comparable | 29,001 | 17.2 | 224.1 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 28,729 | 59.2 | 591.7 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 28,350 | 109.3 | 694.9 |
McCandless Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind McCandless's 228 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
This agency reports via NIBRS, the incident-based system that captures more detail per offense (multiple crimes per incident, victim/offender data) than the older summary counts.
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the Pennsylvania cities closest to McCandless in population. Their populations run from 27,382 to 29,394, against 28,350 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
McCandless sits at 109.3/100K violent (grade A); the Pennsylvania cities below are the nearest matches after size peers are removed.
McCandless at 109.3/100K violent and 694.9/100K property - matched below outside Pennsylvania (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
109.3/100K here; nearest out-of-state matches.
694.9/100K here; violent-rate peers above excluded.
Out-of-state cities whose violent rate moved a similar share from 2023→2024 (+84.6% here); level-based peers above are excluded.
In 2024, McCandless reported 31 violent crimes and 197 property crimes, for a total of 228 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, McCandless's violent crime rate increased by 84.6%, and the property crime rate increased by 17.4%.
The most common crime type in McCandless is larceny-theft, accounting for 82.5% of all reported crimes (188 incidents in 2024).
Mid-size read: McCandless figures are FBI UCR CIUS Table 8 (vintage 2024), population-adjusted per 100,000.
Denominators are the reporting-year population on the municipal row. Incomplete years are dropped from rankings. Confirm at FBI Crime Data Explorer and Census.gov QuickFacts.
Disclaimer (mid-size municipal): figures are informational, not advice. FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program is the source. Consult a professional before decisions.
Mid-size rate methodology for how McCandless's mid-size city row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 McCandless, PA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Put this to use
Put the McCandless, PA FBI UCR record to work: compare peers, open the state atlas, or look up another city.
A citywide UCR rate is a starting point, not a neighbourhood verdict: read the full profile and the year coverage notes before drawing conclusions.
Every figure on PlainCrime is rendered directly from FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) source data, no number is typed in by an editor. McCandless is scored in the mid-size municipal band (28,350 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.