TEXT 5. PART 1: Cluster analysis of municipalities

There is a cluster analysis to sort municipalities into groups. The clusters were formed based on 13 data elements (variables), covering structural, demographic and financial attributes. These variables were chosen because they are typically understood to be characteristics of municipalities of differing types. From this analysis, five major clusters emerged.

Major Urban Centers

The first cluster—major urban centers—may be thought of as a “big city” grouping, although its 19 members include only six cities (Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Yonkers and White Plains), while 13 are towns. Note that New York City was not included in the analysis, as it is unique in size and many other ways, and really cannot be compared to other cities in the State. Although not in New York City’s league, the municipalities in this group are generally very large—both in terms of population and land area. The towns in this cluster include the largest in the State in terms of population. These towns are generally more urban in nature than other towns, and experience challenges similar to those faced by cities. The major urban centers average over 200,000 residents and nearly 70 square miles, and also contain a larger than average foreign-born population (13.5 percent) and a relatively high level of poverty (11 percent). Urban centers have large budgets (given the large populations they serve and their service mix) and have higher-than-average tax rates.

Smaller Urban Centers

This group includes most of the State’s “small cities” and villages. The clustering methodology actually produced two clusters that were separated (by the methodology itself) almost precisely along regional lines. One cluster was located upstate (i.e., anywhere outside of the New York City metropolitan area that includes Long Island, Westchester, Rockland and Putnam counties), while those in the other cluster were located almost exclusively downstate. Our interpretation of these two clusters is that they describe a similar type of community, but given the very different economic and demographic patterns between the New York City metropolitan region and elsewhere, they have some significant differences, and grouped separately under the cluster analysis methodology. Although they both represent a small city/large village type of community and are similar in many respects, there are some clear differences. We named the clusters “smaller urban centers” and attached an upstate or downstate suffix (although they are presented as a single group in our map).

Geographically, these are smaller municipalities, averaging only three to five square miles in size. While both upstate and downstate smaller urban centers are more densely populated than the suburban and rural clusters, smaller urban centers downstate (5,310 residents/square mile) are more than twice as dense as those located upstate (2,237 residents/square mile). The upstate smaller urban centers have a greater percentage of older housing (63 percent constructed prior to 1950) when compared to the other cluster groups, while housing in the downstate smaller urban centers is somewhat newer (42 percent). There is also a significant upstate-downstate difference in both income and property values, with downstate communities having substantially higher property values and income—indicative of the higher cost of living in these downstate communities. Furthermore, both upstate and downstate smaller urban centers spent proportionally more on public safety, which is a functional characteristic of cities and village governments. The smaller urban centers located upstate have the highest rate of poverty compared to the other categories and more than twice the rate of poverty in the downstate category, while downstate communities have a larger foreign-born population. While these two clusters consist mainly of cities and villages, there are also two towns in the upstate cluster. These towns are Tonawanda and Ellicott in Western New York, which have characteristics similar to upstate small cities and villages, such as a more dense population center, older housing and a compact land area. Ellicott, for example, appears more city-like because of high public safety expenditures and a large portion of older housing—two distinctively urban characteristics for upstate communities. The downstate cluster also includes 14 towns.

Date: 2015-01-12; view: 983