How are our children doing in school? What's the trend in job growth in our area? How healthy are local residents? Are we keeping up with other parts of New York State and the nation?

These are the questions that we, the Leadership Alliance for a Vital Community, examine in this Community Indicators project on Herkimer and Oneida counties in Central New York. The project takes a close look at our progress, accomplishments and challenges in 10 topic areas, ranging from Education to Financial Self-Sufficiency to Health to the Arts. We have gathered and analyzed data from dozens of government and other sources to scrutinize our economy and educational system, the condition of our families and youths, and more.

Communities across the nation and world are turning to indicator projects like this one to assess their regions, quantify strengths and challenges, determine priorities and launch community-wide discussions about improving their quality of life. This information provides decision support for planning, policy, and action by funders, program providers, and residents.

On this site, you will find 80 indicators, each one tracking a critical aspect of our community's health. For each indicator, you will discover a description of the indicator, a brief analysis of trends, charts displaying trends over time, and tables providing data for our counties, for a set of comparable counties and for the state and nation.

Learn more about the project...