Waterford, CA has a B safety grade (74/100) with a violent crime rate of 181 per 100,000, 49% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · small city
Waterford is a small municipal reporter (9,387 on the UCR row). Per-100,000 violent and property rates are shown with CA and U.S. context.
Data updated 2026-08-24
Waterford, CA carries a PlainCrime B safety grade with violent crime 49% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Waterford, CA shows violent crime at 181.1 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 884.2 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 49% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade B from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
Small-count caution
Waterford reported 17 violent offences in 2024 against a population of 9,387. At this volume one additional or one fewer report moves the per-100,000 rate noticeably, so the figure is better read as a data point than as a precise measurement, and year-to-year swings here are expected.
Comparable rate records
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Waterford's 181.1 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Santa Clara (182.0), Sutter Creek (182.5), Sonoma (179.5), Menifee (182.8). 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 181.1 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Waterford ranks 354 of 458 — above 104 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is -45.6% against the cohort median of 333.1. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
2020–2024 direction
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 266.1 per 100,000 in 2020 to 181.1 in 2024 (-31.9%). The highest observed value was 266.1 in 2020 and the lowest 180.2 in 2023. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate Waterford'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.
Based on 17 reported violent incidents in a population of 9,387. At this volume, one additional or one fewer report can shift the rate and letter grade noticeably; small-city crime counts are inherently more volatile year to year than large-city counts, so treat this grade as a data point, not a precise ranking.
Small-city offense counts above are voluntary UCR submissions, not neighbourhood advice. Year-to-year swings can look large when the population base is modest.
Across 2.4 Census sq mi, Waterford logged 35.2 property and 7.2 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Waterford's 2024 book concentrates in larceny-theft (61% of 100 offenses; mix index 4,165).
Violent offenses are 17% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Waterford offense mix (2024)
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (2.4 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 | 83 | 884.2 |
| Larceny-Theft | 61 | 649.8 |
| Burglary | 11 | 117.2 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 11 | 117.2 |
| Arson | 1 | 10.7 |
| Violent Crime | 17 | 181.1 |
| Aggravated Assault | 14 | 149.1 |
| Robbery | 2 | 21.3 |
| Rape | 1 | 10.7 |
| Murder | 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 · fell · 2020-2024 · FBI UCR
| Year | Coverage | Population | Violent Rate | Property Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Comparable | 9,019 | 266.1 | 864.8 |
| 2021 | Insufficient reporting | 8,993 | - | - |
| 2022 | Comparable | 9,183 | 217.8 | 773.2 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 9,436 | 180.2 | 879.6 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 9,387 | 181.1 | 884.2 |
Waterford Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Waterford's 100 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
This agency reports via the traditional Summary Reporting System (SRS): aggregate monthly offense counts rather than incident-level detail.
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the California cities closest to Waterford in population. Their populations run from 8,698 to 10,164, against 9,387 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
Waterford sits at 181.1/100K violent (grade B); the California cities below are the nearest matches after size peers are removed.
In 2024, Waterford reported 17 violent crimes and 83 property crimes, for a total of 100 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, Waterford's violent crime rate increased by 0.5%, and the property crime rate increased by 0.5%.
The most common crime type in Waterford is larceny-theft, accounting for 61.0% of all reported crimes (61 incidents in 2024).
Small-city read: Waterford is sourced from FBI UCR Table 8 for 2024; rates use that row's population.
Small-city rows use the same per-100,000 formula; a few unreported years can leave gaps in the trend table. Verify the agency's submission on FBI.gov UCR.
Disclaimer (small city): UCR counts here are informational only. They are not a victimization probability. Source: FBI UCR Program.
Small-city rate methodology for how Waterford's small city row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Waterford, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Every figure on PlainCrime is rendered directly from FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) source data, no number is typed in by an editor. Waterford is scored as a small-city UCR reporter (9,387 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.