For those fascinated by silver linings amid dark clouds, lower crime rates in New Orleans may have been the only good thing resulting from Katrina. Unfortunately, the murder rate is returning faster than the city’s former residents.

Murder is making a comeback in New Orleans.

The city had 30 murders this year through April. That is less than half of the 81 recorded during the first four months of 2005. But New Orleans’ population these days is less than half of what it was before Katrina.

Also, while there were only 17 murders in January through March of this year, there were an alarming 13 slayings in April. That is the most for any month since the Aug. 29 storm, though still well below the monthly average of 22 in 2003 and 2004.

And May has gotten off to a violent start with three slayings, including a shooting that followed an argument in a Bourbon Street bar early Tuesday. (Link)

Which means, at least in the Ninth Ward, that the water is now safer than the street.