The city of Lincoln has been ranked the 6th overall best-run city in America, according to a WalletHub Study comparing 149 of the largest U.S. cities across 36 metrics, grouped into six service categories, which were then measured against the city’s per-capita budget.
In recent years, local governments and leadership have been tested in ways few people could have predicted. A world wide pandemic, looming economic uncertainty and growing wealth inequity, deep political tensions, etc. These challenges have brought local civil leadership into a new light and level of scrutiny. WalletHub analysts sought to measure the effectiveness of local leadership, by comparing how well city officials manage and spend public funds with the quality of services that residents receive.
For each city, WalletHub constructed a “Quality of City Services” score. Lincoln performed exceptionally, landing a score of 62.66. More specifically, Lincoln ranked 19th in Safety. This category considers factors such as violent crime rates, motor vehicle fatalities, share of sheltered homeless persons, and perception of safety (when walking alone during day/night). In Health, Lincoln landed at 54th, this category focuses on average life expectancy, total hospital beds per capita, and quality of public hospitals in the state. In the category of Education, Lincoln was placed at 71st. This metric looks at K-12 school system quality and high school graduation rates. As far as Economy, Lincoln landed nearly in the middle, at 73rd. Some economic metrics analyzed were unemployment and underemployment rates, median annual household income, changes in housing prices, and the share of population living in poverty.
Lincoln’s lowest ranking metric is 114th overall in Infrastructure & Pollution. For this metric WalletHub considers factors like the quality of roads, average commute time, water quality, greenhouse-gas emission, and walk/bike-ability.
Lincoln’s highest ranking metric was Financial Stability, being ranked in 2nd place among the 149 cities analyzed. This metric analyzes outstanding long-term debt per capita, and Moody’s city credit rating.
Below are the top ten best-ran cities according to the study. Read more on Lincoln’s ranking here.
Best-Run Cities in America
- Nampa, ID
- Lexington-Fayette, KY
- Nashua, NH
- Boise, ID
- Provo, UT
- Lincoln, NE
- Fort Wayne, IN
- Sioux Falls, SD
- Las Cruces, NM
- Missoula, MT
(Photo Courtesy: WalletHub, Evolution Finance Inc.)