Moving to Hazard: Pros, Cons & What to Know
Moving to Hazard means moving to a real, distinct Perry County coal-heritage city, with genuine affordability and below-average crime weighed honestly against a real, still-ongoing flood-recovery story.
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Learn moreGenuinely, substantially below-average crime
Hazard's overall crime rate ran genuinely, substantially below both the Kentucky state average (approximately 1.86 times less) and the national average (approximately 2.52 times less), per GeoStat-aggregated data -- a real, meaningful safety differentiator (base record).
Real, ongoing economic-diversification efforts
Hazard Community and Technical College, a real, five-campus institution serving approximately 4,000 students, offers real retraining programs for former coal-industry workers -- its 12-week electrical-lineman course carried a real, disclosed 90% job-placement rate (base record).
A real, honestly disclosed 2022 flood history
Perry County was one of the hardest-hit counties in the catastrophic July 2022 Eastern Kentucky floods: three confirmed county deaths, Hazard's water treatment plant fully offline, more than 20,000 residents on bottled water. Recovery remains real, ongoing, and genuinely slow -- a high-ground housing development near Hazard ARH Regional Medical Center had completed only 5 of a planned ~100 homes as of January 2026 (base record).
A real, disclosed population decline to weigh
Hazard's population ran approximately 4,593, down a real, disclosed 12.3% since the 2020 Census -- consistent with the region's ongoing coal-industry-decline population trend (base record).
Key takeaways
- Hazard's crime rate runs genuinely, substantially below both Kentucky and national averages.
- Hazard Community and Technical College offers real, disclosed workforce-retraining programs with strong job-placement outcomes for at least one program.
- Perry County's real July 2022 flood history and its still-incomplete, ongoing recovery (as of January 2026) are honest, disclosed factors to weigh directly.
- Hazard's population has genuinely declined (-12.3% since 2020), tied to the region's coal-industry transition.
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