Central New York Gets Failing Grades in Best Small Cities Report

We usually like the fine folks at financial services website WalletHub, but we have a beef with their latest study entitled 2018's Best Small Cities in America.

Utica and Rome both ranked near the bottom of 1,268 small towns measured, although we did grade out better than New York State neighbors in Watertown, Newburgh and Binghamton, among others. WalletHub used 40 key metrics and chopped them up into categories like Affordability, Economic Health, Education & Health, Quality of Life, and Safety. Cities with population sizes between 25,000 and 100,000 were included.

Utica's best score was a rank of #423 (again, out of 1,268) in Quality of Life, which is comprised of factors like coffee shops, restaurants, and average commute time. Utica's worst individual category was 1,028th in Economic Health.

Rome ranked slightly better overall than Utica, thanks to decent results in Quality of Life (#385) and Safety (#424), although its Economic Health (#1,059) scored slightly worse.

We need to gather some info and send it back to WalletHub to show 'em how much we disagree with these results. So, help us gather some info. What are the best parts of the Mohawk Valley?