City leaders across the United States always wait with eager anticipation the various reports that are released each year that rank their city in a variety of different categories. Popular topics are: housing prices, cost of living, safest city, and job projections. These rankings help keep people interested in living in a particular area, encourage potential new businesses to come into an area, as well as keep local businesses thriving. One ranking that government officials are not always happy to hear news about is how their city is ranking when it comes to how their often their residents and businesses are dealing with bed bug infestations. For the past few years, two major nationwide exterminations companies, Orkin and Terminix, have been tracking the cities that have had the most bed bug complaints and treatments.
It’s that time of year once again when we learn how our country and the bed bugs are faring in the United States. Orkin has just released their final numbers for the “Top 50 Most Bed Bug Infested Cities in the United States”. Some city leader are happy to see that they have dropped down the list slightly from last year’s ranking and some have dropped significantly which is an indication that the programs, laws, and educational campaigns that they have implemented are beginning to work in their communities. Some cities are disappointed to learn that the bloodsuckers have taken a stronghold on their city.
WLS reported Orkin’s Top 50 Most Bed Bug Infested Cities on March 17, 2012. Here is the top 10. You may read the article here.
1. Cincinnati, Ohio (same ranking as last year)
2. Chicago, Illinois (same ranking as last year)
3. Detroit, Michigan (up from 4th place last year)
4. Denver, Colorado (up from 6th place last year)
5. Los Angeles, California (up from 25th place last year)
6. Columbus, Ohio (down from 3rd place last year)
7. Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas (up from 50th place last year)
8. Washington, DC (down from 5th place last year)
9. New York, New York (down from 7th place last year)
10. Richmond/Petersburg, Virginia (up from 16th place last year)
Clearly, more work needs to be done in 2012 to combat the critters.