Good liberal small towns in the U.S.

[ldoolin]

With all the favorite cities threads, I thought I'd throw this one out:

Small towns tend to be conservative, but what are some really good liberal small towns to live in?

Here are a few that come to mind:

Arcata, CA
Missoula, MT
Lawrence, KS
Rockville, UT
Moab, UT
Flagstaff, AZ
Bangor, ME
Portland, ME
Eugene, OR
Olympia, WA

[WilliamPitt]

1. Bloomington IN; Missoula MT; Boone and Asheville NC; Provincetown MA

[brainshrub]

5. I'll second Asheville, NC.

I should work for the Chamber Of Commerce, I love this town so much.

[Leftist78]

17. another vote for Asheville

I've been considering moving there for a while now.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

19. Yet another vote for Asheville... also for Lawrence, KS

both really nice places

[amazona]

20. Asheville ???

My dad grew up there, and his parents lived their entire lives there...certainly never thought of it as any hotbed of liberalism. Not sure I thought of it as a small town for that matter.

Beautiful country though.

[brainshrub]

21. It's a hot-bed now.

You can't swing a dead cat without hitting an activist.

We have THREE progressive papers here. Lots of organic growers, artists, retired hippies, writers and college students.
There are several food co-ops, a few attempts at an alternativve currency and several people on city-council support a living-wage law.

[G_j]

57. lots of wonderful and committed activists

here, it's a powerful community, but IMO our City Council sux big time! :puke:

yes, the alternative papers rock, and they are all free.

here's one address off the top of my head (The Asheville Global Report)
www.agrnews.org

[Lorien]

48. Me too

I'm a self employed artist. I think I can do it if I just come up with the moving money!

[theorist]

6. Yay for Bloomington!

I'm a grad student here at IU (some call it the Berkeley of the midwest, but I'm not convinced). It's definitely a hip town, but many of the undergrads are conservatives, but the city leadership is clearly liberal.

[salin]

43. welcome to bloomington

even if belated! :D

Have lived in more liberal places (DC and the Bay Area) - but as far as the midwest goes - the town is tops. :hi:

[jpgray]

2. Does Boulder, CO still qualify?

I think I heard it had shifted over.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

3. Liberal towns

Don't know your definition of small town, but here's a list of towns that are at least tolerant if not out and out liberal:

Madison WI
Makanda IL (home of Sen. Paul Simon, my hero!)
Eureka Springs AR
Jasper AR
Fayetteville AR

[bluestateguy]

4. Small towns

I don't know about Flagstaff. I have heard there can be some real rednecks there. College towns might be good: Amherst, MA; Ames, IA; Bennington, VT.

[ldoolin]

28. yes

Flagstaff, Missoula, Moab, and Olympia all have their redneck contingent, but they're places where liberals are becoming more prevalent as time goes on.

There are probably three kinds:
Towns that used to be conservative but are now trending liberal (Flagstaff, Missoula, Moab, Olympia)
Towns that used to be liberal but are now trending conservative (Price, Utah and Clifton, Arizona for example)
Towns that are thoroughly liberal (Arcata, Santa Cruz, Burlington, Ithaca)

[Hoppin_Mad]

7. Santa Cruz, CA ( voted to impeach Chimp - I think ! )

nt

[wryter2000]

8. Maybe we're too big

Oakland, California, aka Oaktown aka Bumpcity

[Athletic Grrl]

46. wryter,

We're upwards of 400K. I think we qualify as a liberal city. I'm in one of the most liberal sections of the city: Piedmont Ave. I can't imagine living anywhere else.

[Chico Man]

9. Providence, RI

2nd largest city in New England, but still a small one.

[youngred]

10. Ithaca NY

Jewel of the finger lakes region, great local wine, an Ivy League University, Beautiful country and exceedingly liberal

[ithacan]

52. I second that!!

this is a wonderful place to live.

The city council is made up of Dems and Greens who ran as Dems. In the city of Ithaca mayoral race, the "Republican" candidate was a democrat who lost in the primary. It was a three way race, between a Green, the Republican and the Democrat (the Democrat won handily, and she's a progressive dem).

And the winters are absolutely beautiful!! Lots of snow and even sunshine sometime. I wouldn't live anywhere else.

[SiobhanClancy]

11. Key West,FL

Not many liberal towns down there,but this one comes close:)

[supernova]

12. Chapel Hill, N.C.

A lovely liberal oasis! :hi:

Edit: Home of the first public university in the nation, great bars and nightlife, and attached town Carrboro was the only town in the nation to declare June 2003 as "National French Trade Month"!

[Philostopher]

13. Yellow Springs, Ohio.

It's a college town -- home of Antioch University. Not sure if it's as liberal as it used to be, but it's still pretty funky; lots of old-line lefties still teach at Antioch. We have a friend who lives there becaue he likes the cultural diversity.

[Gemini Cat]

30. Yellow Springs is great!! nt

[Philostopher]

37. We live in the area.

We've been to their street festival in early autumn a couple of times. It's too far for us to live there -- it would put the Mr. too far from where he works for practicality -- but we like it, too.

Great screen name, by the way!

[Lorien]

47. It's still as liberal

the Land that time forgot! (around 1972, that is). :-)

[amandae]

14. I've lived in Missoula ...

Beautiful area ... pretty liberal ... for Montana that is. Definately has its conservative moments though ...

:hi:

[amandae]

15. BTW ... Welcome to DU!!!!!

:hi:

[SmileyBoy]

16. Duluth, MN, Marquette MI, Ogdensburg, NY and Salem, OR.

That's all I know right now.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

64. Salem????

It's never seemed particularly liberal to me.

Now Corvallis, that's liberal--although not as liberal as Eugene.

[fromVT]

18. Brattleboro, VT

and Northampton, MA

[IronLionZion]

26. isn't all of Vermont liberal?

[HuckleB]

40. Clearly you've never been there.

[IronLionZion]

42. I've always wanted to go

for the skiing as well as the hippies serving tofu omelettes at diners. You've gotta admit Vermont has a reputation for being liberal. Massachusetts too.

[mobuto]

62. But reputations can be deceiving

there are an awful lot of right wing crazies in both Vermont and Massachusetts - for one thing, they both have conservative Republican governors.

Remember, there are a lot of left wing liberals in Texas, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia, so anything can happen.

[IronLionZion]

66. yeah even Moscow, Idaho

has a bunch of socialists but the surrounding area is Nazi. I mean actual neo-nazis who say "heil hitler" not like Ashcroft

[Blade]

22. whoops

hit the button twice. Sorry.

[Blade]

23. Here in MN...

the only town I can think of as being liberal is Duluth, and possibly St. Paul.

[Twillig]

27. It was wonderful to see all the anti-war signs on my visit to Duluth

when I saw my dad last year over New years.. not that it stopped anything, but I'm glad my dad is there.

Kenwood elementary alum here..

[ldoolin]

29. It's a big city, but...

I always thought of Minneapolis as one of the most liberal cities

[mobuto]

24. Great Barrington, MA ; North Hampton, MA

[bicentennial_baby]

34. Northampton

It's one word...Amherst too!

[mobuto]

63. More Coffee Please

When my caffeine level drops, my spelling suffers.

Northampton it is.

And Amherst is a lovely town too.

[IronLionZion]

25. Windber, PA

for some reason the Green party holds local seats in this rural town in Western PA.

just like 10 miles away is my rural town of Somerset which is a Republican stronghold. There are so many far-right religous nuts that democrats don't even run locally. THe confederate flag flies pretty high here but it is not for heritage (this is the NORTH!) its for racism

[durutti]

41. I'm 15 minutes away. :-)

n/t

[IronLionZion]

56. oh yeah, where?

[Ediacara]

31. How small is small? Missoula has 100,000 people

But, yes, VERY liberal. Bozeman MT, at about 35,000 is also pretty liberal, and probably counts as a true small town, rather than a small city like Missoula is.

[ldoolin]

32. MSO is up to 100,000 people? Yikes!

I thought Missoula was about 30,000. Is it growing that fast?

[BuelahWitch]

33. Woo hoo! I'm in Lawrence!!!

And it IS a great place to live. I've been here for over 2 years and love it! :bounce:

[ikojo]

54. Lawrence KS or MA?

I have been to Lawrence KS only once but thought it was a nice town.

Columbia, MO is also a pretty liberal city as far as Missouri goes. They had a can deposit law until Anheuser Busch rammed an ordinance through which banned deposits on cans.

[maxanne]

35. did you mean to say small cities?

Portland, ME's population is about 65,000.

Jackson, NH is 935. I think I live in a small town. ;-)

[Nikia]

49. I was wondering that too

Don't some of the listed cities even have populations over 100,000. I'm not sure where most people draw the line, but I wouldn't refer to any of those places as small towns.

[ldoolin]

67. I was thinking anything under maybe 70,000 (n/t)

[mdmc]

36. WOODSTOCK, NY

Yeah, BOY!

[neebob]

38. Durango, CO

I keep hearing it's actually conservative, and I know there's a good-ol'-boy network and the Frighthorse does live nearby in Ignacio, but I sure don't meet very many wingnuts. I'm surrounded by like-minded people. We also had a resolution against the Patriot Act.

[HuckleB]

39. Add Ashland, OR and Port Townsend, WA to the list.

[salin]

44. not a small town - but not a large city... one vote for Ann Arbor, MI

n/t

[IronLionZion]

55. I second that

but the liberal-ness comes from UofM Go BLUE! There are lots of conservatives in that area including the headquarters of the ANP (American Nazi Party) in Westland which is like 20 minutes away.

[WindRavenX]

45. Mad props to Eugene, OR

Very very liberal.
Too bad the rest of the fing state (except for Portland and Salem) is a right wing cess pool.

[argyl]

50. Taos,NM.Garberville,CA.

xx

[carpetbagger]

51. Terlingua, TX.

Population's about 500 or so, and the only radio station is an alternative station.

[FDRrocks]

53. Potstown, PA

Damned hippies!

[Guaranteed]

58. Arcata is AWESOME.

Not only the most liberal town in the United States, but probably the friendliest, too. I spent some time there when my ex g/f went to HSU. Every single one of the folks that live there will actually make EYE CONTACT!! with you as you walk down the street, and say "Hi!" I have YET to see another town with such good people.

They smoke a lot of pot, too. :)

[democracy eh]

59. Ithaca, NY?

is it still up there? visited a few times, home to Moosewood, Ithaca Hours. ecovillage, etc... might have changed since I was there last

ithaca used to be rated high by Utne Reader

[trogdor]

61. I've heard Ithaca was that way.

So is Clinton, home of wannabe-Ivy-League Hamilton College.

[Jack_Dawson]

60. Davis, CA

[sistersofmercy]

65. Santa Fe

I was just there pop is 60 thousand, incredible place with a vibe all its own.