Tuesday, January 13, 2004

By Tom Barnes, Post-Gazette Harrisburg Bureau

HARRISBURG -- Stressed out by traffic jams and potholes on the parkways, Pittsburgh's junk-bond financial status and its underachieving pro sports teams?

Maybe you should be in Harrisburg, which, according to a new survey, is one of the least stressful places in America.

In the survey of 100 metropolitan areas compiled by Sperling BestPlaces, a publication based in Portland, Ore., the Harrisburg region, which stretches from Carlisle in the west to Hershey and Lebanon in the east, came in second best.

The only Metropolitan Statistical Area that was considered less stressful was the Albany-Schenectady area of New York. Albany, like Harrisburg, is a state capital, which played an important role in the rankings because a plethora of state jobs helped hold down the unemployment rate.

The Sperling survey, done annually, ranks the top 100 metropolitan regions in the United States for stress caused by unemployment, rates of violent crime and crimes against property, alcohol consumption, commuting time, rates of divorce and suicide, and the number of days each month that are "partially cloudy or completely overcast."

For November 2003, according to the state labor department, the Harrisburg area's jobless rate was 3.6 percent, compared with 5 percent for Pittsburgh, 5.4 percent for Philadelphia, 5.2 percent for Pennsylvania and 5.9 percent for the nation.

David Black, president of the Harrisburg Regional Chamber of Commerce, was glad to hear about the ranking but still quibbled with it.

"We are much less dreary than Albany and our winters are shorter, so I might question why we're not No. 1," he said.

After Albany and Harrisburg, areas that were lowest in stress were Orange County, Calif; Nassau-Suffolk counties on Long Island, N.Y.; Minneapolis-St. Paul; Ann Arbor, Mich; Omaha, Neb.; Norfolk and Virginia Beach, Va.; Honolulu; Raleigh-Durham, N.C.; and Scranton-Wilkes Barre.

The most stressful places to live were Tacoma, Wash. (high divorce and unemployment and many cloudy days); Miami (highest violent crime rate in the survey); New Orleans (high crime and joblessness); Las Vegas (highest suicide and divorce rates in the study); and New York City (long commutes to work plus crime). The next five most stressful cities were Portland, Ore.; Mobile, Ala.; Stockton-Lodi, Calif; Detroit; and Dallas.

Despite its well-publicized problems involving deficits and layoffs, Pittsburgh didn't fare badly in the survey. It was ranked 74th out of 100, meaning only 26 cities were found to be less stressful.

"Most of the top 10 stress cities are grappling with high unemployment," said Bert Sperling, who oversees the BestPlaces survey. "It affects the entire community. Rising unemployment has been tied to increased crime" and other social ills like divorce, alcoholism and suicide.

Low-stress cities are often state capitals or towns with colleges and universities, which tend to keep employment levels stable, he said. The company got the information for its rankings from FBI crime statistics, the U.S. Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Climatic Data Center.

"The state Capitol must be exempt from that survey," quipped state Rep. Frank LaGrotta, D-Ellwood City. "I like Harrisburg, but I've never found my job to be stress-less."

LaGrotta said the Harrisburg area, with attractive neighborhoods a short commute from Downtown, several good school districts and recreation on City Island in the Susquehanna River, "is a great place. But my job's always about overdue budgets, tax increases, casinos and other stressful things."

Other local officials wondered about the low-stress rating. Highways around here are increasingly jammed, especially a section of Interstate 81 north of the Pennsylvania Turnpike exit at Carlisle. In the last six months, it's turned into a death stretch, with several accidents that have killed a total of 10 motorists.

Also surprised to hear about the lack of stress was Harrisburg Mayor Stephen Reed, who's been involved in recent public battles with city council over the budget, police layoffs and his controversial plan to create a Wild West Museum as a way to lure tourists.

"You couldn't prove it by me," he told the Harrisburg Patriot-News, which described the mayor as "a chain-smoking insomniac workaholic." Reed, who's been mayor for 20 years, is credited with making life more interesting here by bringing in the minor-league Senators baseball team, opening up a Civil War Museum and boosting night life by adding restaurants and bars along Second Street, Downtown.

Black said "third-party endorsements" like the stress survey are important in attracting businesses, visitors and residents.

He said the BestPlaces survey follows a ranking last May by Yahoo.com Magazine, which named the Harrisburg area as "one of the nation's 40 top 'wired' cities," meaning it has "a good infrastructure for telecommunications."

Black said the region scored well not just because of state government jobs, but also military installations like the Army War College in Carlisle, Fort Indiantown Gap northeast of Harrisburg and a Navy logistics and supply depot in Mechanicsburg, just west of Harrisburg.

"We will use this for marketing the area to businesses," he said.

The BestPlaces survey has been done for the last 15 years by Sperling, president of Fast Forward Inc. in Portland. The purpose, according to its Web site, is to help real estate professionals and the public learn "facts about cities and living so you can make better decisions about the best places to live, work, retire, play or relocate."

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