Philly Ranked Sixth Most LGBT-Friendly City in the Country


Photo courtesy of Philly Bricks.

Photo courtesy of Philly Bricks.

In anticipation of Pride month, consumer advocacy site NerdWallet has pulled together a variety of statistics and data to come up with their third annual list of America’s most LGBT-friendly cities. To get their results, they collected data from recent Gallup polls on LGBT population, FBI hate crime statistics, the Human Rights Campaign’s 2014 Municipal Equality Index, and HRC rankings on hospitals leading the way in LGBT health care equality.

After everything was tallied and crunched, Philadelphia found itself at No. 6 on the list, just behind Baltimore and ahead of Seattle and Salt Lake City. The top 10 are represented in this nifty infographic:

Philadelphia scored particularly high in the municipal equality index part, with a score of 116. That number, NerdWallet says, tied San Francisco for the highest in its study. “Philadelphia scored high for its nondiscrimination and relationship recognition policies, LGBT services and relationship with the community.” More on their Philadelphia findings:

In the Philadelphia metro area, nearly 4% of the population identifies as LGBT. The FBI didn’t receive any reports of hate crimes related to gender identity or sexual orientation in the city for 2013. Philadelphia also tied for the highest score in the Human Rights Campaign Municipal Equality Index. In Philadelphia, the heart of LGBT nightlife is centered in what is nicknamed “The Gayborhood.” This year, Philadelphia is marking the 50th anniversary of the LGBT civil rights movement with a four-day celebration beginning July 2. The city is home to several civil rights, advocacy and LGBT youth organizations including the Bread & Roses Community Fund, the Spruce Foundation and the Gay and Lesbian Latino AIDS Education Initiative (GALAEI).

What do you think? Did we get a fair score? Explore more data from the study, which details Philly and other cities, here.