The Milken Institute has named the Auburn-Opelika metropolitan area as the nation's 10th-best performing small city in its 2015 Best-Performing Cities report.
Auburn-Opelika once again claims its top 10 spot after another year of growth, according to the Milken report. The metro area was ranked 10th in 2014 after jumping 27 spots from its 2013 ranking of 37. In 2012, the cities were ranked 89th.
"We're very fortunate that this has happened to us a couple of times," said Auburn Mayor Bill Ham. "It's a great thing for the community, for the city's overall reputation. It's good for business. We're very positive."
From 2009-14, the metro area has had the 11th best job growth, according to the report. From 2013-14, the area had the 25th best short-term job growth.
According to the report, Auburn-Opelika's top-tier performance is thanks to stability and demand provided by Auburn University. Moreover, the city provides an environment that ensures a low cost for doing business and favorable demographic trends.
"A lot of things that are contributing facts are right there at Auburn University — the collaborative efforts that we have together," Ham said.
In the report, the Milken Institute states that one of the cities' only liabilities is dysfunction in Montgomery over the state's budget. As funds have been shifted away from education, the report states that the reallocations could present a downside risk to the metro area. Montgomery will begin debating the Fiscal Year 2017 budget late next spring.
"The increased accolades that Auburn University gets as one of the top public universities in America, and our public elementary and high schools certainly help the factors that determine this ranking," Ham said.
One of the University's largest impacts on the state economy delineates from its ability to attract high-tech industry. GE Aviation selected one of its facilities in the city of Auburn as the home of a new additive manufacturing facility, which began developing the additive this year. The company constructed a $50 million, 300,000-square-foot facility to develop the additive.
GE's selection of Auburn as hub for its aviation manufacturing subsidiary is just one example of Auburn's ability to attract high-tech jobs. According to the report, Auburn-Opelika had the 13th best high-tech GDP growth for small cities in the nation.
"Twenty-plus years ago there were very few cases that an Auburn University graduate could stay in Auburn and get a really good job," Ham said. "With the announcement of Equifax, now software engineering students and other curricula like it [can stay in Auburn]. It's a direct conduit to those types of jobs."
According to Ham, the founding of the Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine on Auburn's campus also helped contribute to the city's high ranking.
"One of the things I would point to is certainly VCOM and the advent of having a medical school in our community," Ham said. "There are so many things that a lot of people don't realize. It's a huge factor in so many of the categories that help rank a community for quality of life."
Other Alabama cities also made the list, but none beat Auburn's placement. Tuscaloosa is ranked 77 on the list of best performing small cities, gaining 11 spots from its ranking last year. Huntsville is the highest ranked large Alabama city on the institute's report of large cities, but it still dropped 74 spots on the list — from 66 in 2014 to 140 this year.
Montgomery, Tuscaloosa and Auburn were the only cities with a neutral or positive increase on the list. Montgomery gained 12 spots.
"While 10 is great, we'd like to be No.1," Ham said. "We're going to continue our effort to bring in top companies and make this a community with a quality of life that is as good as it can be."
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