Nevada ranked 34th in ‘livability’

Thursday, May 16, 2002 | 8:54 a.m.

Longtime Nevada residents have frequently seen their home bashed by experts comparing the Silver State to other parts of the country.

Now another study finds the state not only faring badly, but actually slipping.

Morgan Quitno, a research and publishing firm in Lawrence, Kan., prepares an annual list ranking states by their "livability." This year Nevada placed 34th among the 50 states, down eight places from last year.

The ranking takes into account 43 factors from federal and state data, including crime rates, cost of living, teacher-student ratios, electricity prices, tax rates, health insurance coverage, employment rates and road fatality numbers.

Scott Morgan is one of the firm's founders and an analyst for the company, which specializes in making comparative rankings. He said he's used to getting phone calls from reporters in Nevada.

He said the state's poor showing this year could be once again chalked up to the fact that more than two-thirds of the state's population lives in the Las Vegas urban area.

"Nevada is sort of unique," he said. "It is beset by urban problems. ... Any state with a significant portion of its population in urban areas is going to have numbers that are different from a state like, say, Iowa."

Iowa has consistently ranked among the top 10 most livable states in the past 10 years, according to the company. This year, Iowa was barely edged out of first place by Minnesota.

Morgan said the ranking does not mean Iowa is more exciting or entertaining than Nevada.

"There are probably a lot more interesting things to do, places to go" in the Las Vegas area, he said, than in Iowa.

The top three most livable states -- Minnesota, Iowa and New Hampshire -- all are notorious for foul winter weather, Morgan noted.

He said the weather issue helped Nevada. Morgan Quitno used to use 41 factors to judge relative livability, but because of complaints from states in the South and Southwest, it added average temperature and number of annual sunny days to the survey.

"We're not trying to rank vacation spots," Morgan cautioned. "We're just trying to rank boring livability indexes."

Kara Kelley, president of the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce and a Nevada defender, said she believes that the state and region are good places to live.

She pointed out that the Clark County population grew by an estimated 80,000 people last year, more than the population growth of the top three states combined.

Kelley said that is not to say the Midwest or other areas are not pleasant places to live.

"Livability is probably in the eye of the beholder," she said. "I find Southern Nevada an extraordinary place to live."

Hal Rothman, a University of Nevada, Las Vegas history professor, said he is not surprised by the relatively poor showing in Morgan Quitno's annual ranking.

Two factors hurt the state, he said: The Sept. 11 attacks dealt a blow to tourism, putting thousands out of work. And the area constantly wrestles with the effects of massive growth.

Despite rankings that find the state less livable than others, the pace of people moving here still seems to be accelerating.

"Growth at this pace, nobody's ever kept up with anywhere," Rothman said. "The thing that gets me, more people moved here in September 2001 than September 2000.

"More and more, this has become more than a place to visit. It has become a place to stay."

Rothman, author of "Neon Metropolis: How Las Vegas Started the 21st Century," said he understands why Nevada might fare poorly in a comparative ranking -- but does not agree with the conclusion.

"I love the weather here," he said. "I'm a hot weather guy. I love the heat."