Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
A town of 5,433, settled in 1859.
Forest earns a D, 78th among Mississippi's 99 graded towns, mostly because of health and incomes. Residents are less healthy than 95% of U.S. towns on CDC estimates. The median household income is $50K, and 34% of residents live below the poverty line. What it does well: it is more walkable than 75% of U.S. towns. 34% of residents live below the poverty line in Forest, above both the Mississippi town median (21%) and the median of U.S. towns (9.6%). Forest's civic life (library use, community groups, volunteering) trails 98% of U.S. towns. Forest has 3 places on the National Register of Historic Places, among them Moore Lookout Tower and US Post Office-Forest.
Where Forest beats most towns, and one thing worth knowing.
Where Forest’s working residents go each day. Line width shows the share.
Census LEHD 2023
Each subject compared with towns across the country (schools within Mississippi), ordered by how far Forest is from typical.
How TownRatings grades towns →
Census counts: 547 in 1890, 5,430 in 2020. The archive holds 2 old photos and papers going back to 2015 and 4 maps from 1922 on.
3 places on the National Register of Historic Places.
Who provides power, water and the rest in Forest, and how to reach them.
EPA SDWIS (Oct 9, 2026) · HIFLD + EIA-861 2025 · Census 2020 ZCTAs · NCES 2024–25 · registration: vote.gov, updated Nov 18, 2024.
Ordered by what stands out in Forest.
Forest draws workers from Morton and beyond, fares better on crime within Mississippi than nationally and has homes that are cheap against local pay.
Within Mississippi it is less healthy than 75% of the 101 graded towns: much of Mississippi scores lower on these measures.
For adults in Forest, the share who have high blood pressure is 44%. Only 9 of the 101 Mississippi towns we compare have a higher share of adults who get no exercise outside work than Forest. This Mississippi town does better than the Mississippi average on 1 of 31 CDC measures and worse on 12.
| Forest | Mississippi towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Food insecurity (CDC PLACES) | 36% | 24% | 14% |
| No health insurance, 18–64 (CDC PLACES) | 23% | 12% | 8.1% |
| Get no exercise (CDC PLACES) | 43% | 36% | 25% |
| Fair or poor health (CDC PLACES) | 32% | 27% | 19% |
| What stands out | Forest | MS |
|---|---|---|
| Fewer adults who have had cancer | 5.7% | 7.6% |
| More uninsured adults | 23.1% | 11.5% |
CDC PLACES 2025 · modeled estimates for adults · CMS · HRSA
Public schools: the Forest Municipal School District. The largest public high school is Forest High School, with 438 students. Two of its 4 schools are below, each with the reason it’s listed.
| School | Level | Students | Letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Forest ElementaryLargest public elementary schoolGrades PK–4 | Grades PK–4 | 740 | C+ |
| Forest High SchoolLargest public high schoolGrades 9–12 | Grades 9–12 | 438 | C |
NCES · EDFacts · graded within MS on state tests and graduation
6,785 jobs are based in Forest, 3.4 for every working resident, so most of the people who work here commute in. Jobs based here grew from 4,897 in 2013 to 6,785.
Employers in Forest added 1,888 jobs between 2013 and 2023, to 6,785. 32% of working residents work locally locally. The top destinations are Morton (8%), Jackson (7%) and Sebastopol (3%). The average trip to work here is 20 minutes.
| Forest | Mississippi towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Working residents who work in town | 32% | 19% | 8% |
| Average trip to work | 20 minutes | 23 minutes | 25 minutes |
| Median household income | $50,000 | $50,000 | $80,000 |
Census LEHD 2023 · ACS
2.7 miles of trail. Forest’s trail network density is 0.2 miles per square mile.
Trails & parks © OpenStreetMap contributors · Conserved land: USGS PAD-US
At 1.9 years of the Jackson metro’s $62K median household income, the typical home (about $116K) costs less against local pay than in 89% of Mississippi towns; that ratio is one input to its B+ for cost of living.
The share of households in Forest who own their home: 51%. Typical home values rose 4.5% in the year to September 2026. The median rent for Forest comes to $900 a month.
| Forest | Mississippi towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Households that own their home | 51% | 62% | 73% |
| Median rent | $900 a month | $909 a month | $1,185 a month |
Census ACS, 2020–24 · Zillow Home Value Index · Redfin Data Center
At 33.7 crimes per 1,000 residents a year, it reports more crime than 61% of Mississippi’s graded towns. Reported crimes fell from 124 to 73 over the last three FBI years, a drop beyond ordinary year-to-year swings.
For Forest, the rate of reported violence is 3.7 per 1,000 residents. Its rate of thefts and burglaries stands at 9.9 per 1,000 residents.
| Forest | Mississippi towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Violent crimes per 1,000 (2025) | 3.7 per 1,000 residents | 2.2 | 1.6 |
| Property crimes per 1,000 (2025) | 9.9 per 1,000 residents | 17.3 | 9.9 |
FBI crime data, 2025 · crimes reported to police
27% never finished high school. Forest: 20% of adults 25 and older hold a bachelor’s degree or more. Also worth knowing: in Forest, the midpoint age is 36 years.
| Forest | Mississippi towns | U.S. towns | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aged 65 or older | 13% | 17% | 18% |
| Bachelor’s degree or more, 25+ | 20% | 25% | 29% |
| Median age | 36 years | 37 years | 40.5 years |
45% women, 55% men
About 123 men for every 100 women (the survey’s margin: ±4.6 points). Across Mississippi, 51.5% of residents are women.
| Forest | MS | U.S. | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 10 | 15.2% | 12.1% | 11.6% |
| 10 to 17 | 17.5% | 11.2% | 10.3% |
| 18 to 24 | 6.7% | 9.8% | 9.1% |
| 25 to 34 | 10.6% | 12.6% | 13.7% |
| 35 to 44 | 15.4% | 12.6% | 13.2% |
| 45 to 54 | 9.6% | 12% | 12.2% |
| 55 to 64 | 11.9% | 12.6% | 12.7% |
| 65 to 74 | 7.3% | 10.4% | 10.2% |
| 75 and older | 5.7% | 6.8% | 7% |
| No diploma | 26.5% | 12.9% | 10.4% |
| High school | 31% | 29.9% | 26% |
| Some college | 18.1% | 21.2% | 19.1% |
| Associate’s | 4.5% | 10.9% | 8.8% |
| Bachelor’s | 9.3% | 15.3% | 21.6% |
| Graduate | 10.5% | 9.9% | 14.1% |
U.S. Census Bureau · ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimates
The Raleigh 6n weather station, 16 miles away, records that the frost-free season runs about 221 days: longer than most of the country, but shorter than 82% of Mississippi places with climate records.
July afternoons reach 91°, January nights drop to 35° and snow is almost unheard of.
NOAA U.S. Climate Normals, 1991–2020
Federal aid has come to Forest households in 4 declared disasters; the latest was in 2024. Storm and flood damage is expected to run lower than in 55% of U.S. communities. Just over a third of the town’s expected losses from natural hazards come from inland flooding, followed by tornadoes at 21%. Flood insurance has paid out on 10 claims here since 1990.
FEMA disaster declarations and aid · FEMA flood insurance claims · FEMA National Risk Index · OpenFEMA
None within 15 miles of Forest; the nearest are
About 5 of every 100 Forest residents are enrolled in college, about the same as Mississippi.
10 notable people were born in Forest.
City in Mississippi, United States
Forest is a city in and the county seat of Scott County, Mississippi, United States. As of the 2020 census, Forest had a population of 5,430. The population is a minority-majority.
From Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 · facts via Wikidata (CC0)
Short answers, built from the data on this page.
Forest grades D overall, better than 9% of U.S. towns and #78 of 99 in Mississippi. It grades D− for health, C− for safety and C− for schools. Health is its weak spot, with a D−.
Not for the area. That is 1.9 years of the area's median household income ($61,644 across the Jackson, MS metro area). Cost of living, which also weighs rents, property taxes and how many households pay 30% or more of their income for housing, grades B+.
10 notable people were born here, including Arthur Crudup and Donald Gray Triplett.