NAPOLEON, Ohio — The city of Napoleon has made a list of the top ten cities in Ohio, but not for the reason you think.
A travel safety website called TravelSafe-Abroad.com recently published an article that ranks the Henry County city as the eighth most dangerous in the entire state, just five spots behind Toledo. The list includes Akron at ninth, Lima fifth and Cleveland as the most dangerous city in Ohio.
"I'm kind of surprised," resident Chad Oberhaus said. "I don't feel that way. I walk up and down the streets on a regular basis."
Some, like Oberhaus, have lived in the same community for decades.
"This is a very small, rural farming community," resident Patricia Birkhold said. "I've never felt unsafe here."
And others visit the town on a regular basis.
"Obviously if I felt that it was dangerous, I wouldn't come here," Kelli Ratliff, of Northwood, said.
It's not just people on the street who were surprised. Napoleon City Manager Andy Small said he couldn't believe it when he saw it.
"I think we laughed when we heard that after a council meeting, and thought it was rather comical," Small, who once served as the city's mayor from 2000 to 2012, said.
The article cites data that indicates the crime rate is at almost 36 violent incidents per 1,000 people. But Small isn't sure how the website arrived at that number.
The website hyperlinks its crime numbers to another website, CrimeData.org, which says it "gathered every available piece of data from every available police department" and uses machine learning to fill in perceived gaps in its data.
The article also cites the existence of the Napoleon Outdoor Refreshment Area -- or NORA -- as a potential safety problem, writing "nearby residents may encounter intoxicated people who have just departed from the NORA."
But in the five years the NORA has existed, Small said there has not been a single incident related to the district.
"We got the input from our police chief," Small said. "He had absolutely no problems with the renewal and stated there have been zero problems with the NORA."
Small said it's possible some readers take the article seriously but is confident most people feel safe visiting Napoleon.
"There's not a street in this community that I would hesitate to walk," he said. "It's just your, I hate to say, average, standard midwestern community."
WTOL 11 reached out to the TravelSafe-Abroad.com team to get their explanation for why Napoleon was on the list. We are still waiting for a response.
TravelSafe-Abroad.com also claims that Louisville, Kentucky, is northeast of Canton. Kentucky does not border eastern Ohio; Pennsylvania does. Louisville is actually over five hours southwest of Canton.