I went to Portland for a week last year. I saw 6 different instances of a violent, obviously mentally ill, presumably homeless person physically attack a random person (once at a restaurant, twice at a tram station, thrice on the street, all broad daylight). That was more instances that I had seen in 5 years in Philadelphia, a city jokingly referred to as Killadelphia.

Portland might not have a lot of gang violence (which is what really gets numbers up), but not violent isn't how I would describe the city.