When I talk about "best places to live for black people", I have specific criteria I'm basing that on. Everyone's personal criteria varies, but here's mine:
•a large city with a sizable population: I don't believe the best places for Black folk are anywhere rural, because Rural America tends to be cut off from the resources cities have access to. I also don't think smaller cities are the best places either...
Gotta be a city that anchors a metropolitan area of half a million people at minimum. The larger a place is, the more access it has to federal and civic resources, entertainment options, and economic and business opportunities. More access to all of these things is never a bad thing for black people;
•"sizable" black population to me is nuanced. A city like Los Angeles only being ~8% black is still ~320,000 black people. You can't exclusively measure this in percentages, but there has to be alot of black people in said city. I don't want to live anywhere there isn't a lot of Black people, and you know it when you see it;
•my kids are being educated in the public school system. Most cities have shaky systems, however there are those that shine really bright, like here in Raleigh, and in Virginia Beach. We are behind the curve everywhere but a large city with an above average public system is extremely attractive;
•economic mobility for black people: to me this means a diverse range of career opportunities for us, that pay us well relative to national average;
•representation! This shyt is huge, we have to see ourselves in the public positions (police, fire, city/county positions, city council, school board, etc). An area that doesn't have us represented in "everyday" positions is not a good place for us;
•relatively low violent crime. This is also important, especially having kids. These cities that are outta control with the carjackings, that's a negative. Outta control gun violence, negative. It's a major reason why Memphis despite being ~60%+ black, could never be a top place for black folk (ain't the only reason though). This shyt matters;
•relatively low black poverty, ain't no way a city that has a huge chunk of its black citizens living in poverty is great for black people. This also ties into my economic mobility point, which, there's a wealth gap between us and whites everywhere, but the strongest cities for us have that shyt on thinner margins;
•healthy infrastructure. How is the public transit? Healthcare? Primary and secondary education options?
•black-themed culture, in terms of entertainment and arts and media and events and dining abd retail. We gotta have ourselves represented in a city's culture.
These are huge, objective criteria, so call it The Big Nine. Subjectively I can introduce shyt like climate, but we can thrive in any climate so long as most other needs are met. I'm not a fan of long cold winters, I'm not a fan of the general landscape of the Midwest, so for me any places like that are almost instantly axed, but this is entirely subjective. I also like a more diverse city, as I think that enhances the overall worldliness of us as a people, we learn how to relate to and deal with people of a different backgrounds...
I have no desire to live somewhere that's almost exclusively black/white, but again this is subjective and isn't the same for all of us...
So when we define what "best for Black people" means, we can more accurately compare and contrast cities...