Bremerton’s violent crime rate has drastically dropped, according to statistics released last week by the FBI.

And Police Chief Steve Strachan was happy to share the numbers with the city council at this week’s council meeting.

“At one point, Bremerton had the highest rate of property crime in the state,” Strachan said. “But now we’re dropped to 38th. We’re below Tacoma, Everett and Seattle.”

According to the recent data, Bremerton has 48.95 property crimes per 1,000 people. The highest rate in the state is Tukwila at 167.42 per 1,000.Tacoma is 12th, Everett is 13th and Seattle is 27th.

Bremerton’s rate of violent crime also has dropped, Strachan said.

In 2005, we were the worst in that state,” he said, noting Bremerton had 11.7 incidents per 1,000 residents. “Today that has dropped to 5.71 per 1,000.”

That gives Bremerton the rank of 15th in the state.

Fife is listed was the worst at 9.49 violent crimes per 1,000 people. Tacoma is second at 8.69 crimes per 1,000 and Seattle is 13th at 5.85 crimes per 1,000.

“To a person who is a victim of a violent crime, the numbers don’t matter,” he said. “But what we’re seeing is that there’s a growing sense of community in Bremerton and that’s making a difference.”

An example, he said, is that neighbors are calling 911 and reporting suspicious events rather than ignoring things that seem out of place.”There’s more of a feeling that we are in this together,” he said.

One area, however, where Bremerton still has work to do is in aggravated assaults. Statistically, aggravated assaults are classified under violent crimes.

“Our aggravated assaults are up,” he said. “But a majority of those situations are fights where the two subjects know each other.”

Other areas where Bremerton’s crime rates remained high were in domestic violence reports and DUIs.

City Council member Leslie Daugs asked Strachan about statistics on human trafficking, in reference to a human trafficking bust made in Bremerton recently.

“The recent bust definitely was done to send the message that that kind of crime won’t be tolerated her,” he said. “Sometimes, trying to get data on that kind of crime is like trying to capture smoke — there’s no specific location where it’s going to happen.”

But he said he’d report back to the council soon with an update on sex trafficking crime rates.