moving on up

Dallas-Fort Worth climbs 5 spots on U.S. News’ prestigious list of best places to live 2022

Who wouldn't want to live here?

Photo by benedek/Getty Images

Bad news for Austin, good news for Dallas-Fort Worth: While Texas' capital city has been knocked out of the top 10 in U.S. News & World Report’s annual ranking of the best places to live in the U.S., DFW has moved up five spots.

DFW landed at No. 32 on the 2022 list, up from No. 37 last year.

The Austin metro area tumbled from No. 5 last year to No. 13 this year. It does remain the top-ranked place in Texas, though; DFW is No. 2.

For this year’s ranking, U.S. News considered key factors for 150 metro areas such as job availability, housing affordability, quality of life, and desirability. This year, the publication added data about air quality for the first time.

Of DFW, U.S Newssays, "Offering both big-city excitement and quiet, suburban living, the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area has an interesting mix of Texas pride and cosmopolitan offerings. The cowboy life still exists in Fort Worth, while Dallasites love the trendy local bars and numerous retail shops. And no matter which part of the metroplex they call home, sports fans rally together behind their professional sports teams."

They cite DFW residents' friendliness and note that there are a lot more of us.

"People from both demographics are flooding the area, and the population has swelled from about 5.8 million people in 2005 to more than 7 million people today," they write. "New developments have drawn in both families looking for their dream home and professionals looking to advance their careers."

Huntsville, Alabama, grabbed the No. 1 spot in 2022 from last year’s top-ranked metro, Boulder, Colorado. Huntsville came in third place last year.

“Much of the shakeup we see at the top of this year’s ranking is a result of changing preferences,” Devon Thorsby, real estate editor at U.S. News, says in a news release. “People moving across the country today are putting more emphasis on affordability and quality of life than on the job market, which in many ways takes a back seat as remote work options have become more standard.”

Elsewhere in the U.S. News rankings:

Houston landed at No. 59, down from No. 39 last year.
San Antonio landed at No. 83, down from No. 75 last year.
Killeen landed at No. 108, up from No. 114 last year.
Beaumont landed at No. 109, up from No. 124 last year.
El Paso landed at No. 124, up from No. 131 last year.
Corpus Christi landed at No. 133, down from No. 129 last year.
Brownsville landed at No. 134, up from No. 140 last year.
McAllen landed at No. 138, up from No. 139 last year.

rankings

Death Penalty

Tarrant County man gets death for murder of convenience store owner

Tarrant County Sheriff's Office

Christopher Turner

A man received the death penalty for his 2020 cold-blooded execution of a convenience store owner.

According to a release from the office of Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney Phil Sorrells, a Tarrant County jury sentenced Christopher Karon Turner, 48, to death on November 20 for executing convenience store owner Anwar Ali during a robbery. Tarrant County Assistant District Attorneys Charles Boulware and Allenna Bangs represented the state.

On March 27, 2020, at around 6:15 am, Turner, a convicted felon, wore a surgical mask and a glove and entered the Super Big Country Mart in an unincorporated area of Tarrant County south of Fort Worth. There, he held a gun to the back of Anwar Ali, the 62-year-old store owner, and walked him through the store.

Ali did everything Turner demanded, including opening the cash register to give him money. And yet Turner forced Ali into the bathroom and onto his knees, and shot him in the neck. Ali was discovered, dead in the bathroom, about an hour later.

Turner fled the store in Ali's Toyota minivan with the money from the register and Ali's wallet. In the van, he found more than $50,000 cash in a black bag. Over the next few days, Turner went on a shopping spree, buying cars, jewelry, drugs, clothes, and more. He and others used cash and a credit card that belonged to Ali.

Turner fled to Colorado where U.S. Marshals arrested him. On his body they found a firearm which was determined to be the murder weapon.

"This was a premeditated, cold-blooded murder," Boulware told the jury. "From the moment he was charged with this crime, he has tried to escape responsibility."

Bangs noted that before this trial began, Turner obtained the names of jurors and their telephone numbers, and gave them to an inmate charged with murder. At the trial on November 20, as Bangs addressed the jury, Turner tried to hold up a sign to the jury but was handcuffed by Sheriff's deputies who removed him from the courtroom, while he yelled out "she lied."

Ali came to the United States from Pakistan decades ago to pursue the American dream. Ali's son, Hussein, spoke in the courtroom after the death penalty was announced. "Thank you for giving us justice," Ali said. "I hope there are no more devils like this person."