With the New Year on the horizon, people throughout the country are resolving to improve their health in 2025.

While much of health is based on your personal choices and discipline, where you live, and the resources available can also impact you.

With this in mind, the financial information and advice site SmartAsset ranked 100 of the largest U.S. cities based on 10 health factors, including self-reported physical and mental well-being, obesity, smoking, drinking, air pollution, sleep quality, and household income. Data in the study came from County Health Rankings & Roadmaps and the U.S. Census Bureau.

Several California metro areas made SmartAsset's top 20 Healthiest Cities in America for 2025, including the top-rated metro area in the nation.

Here's what to know:

San Jose is the healthiest city in the US

San Jose, the third largest city in California, consistently rates among the nation's fittest communities and best places to live. In the study, San Jose ranked first in four out of 10 health metrics, including self-reported physically healthy days (27.52 out of 30), mentally healthy days (26.00 out of 30), smoking (7.4% of adults), and obesity rates (18.5% of adults). The city ranked within the top 20% for all metrics except for air pollution, which ranked 60th.

Related:Consider San Jose if you plan to move. It was named one of the best places to live

Meanwhile, fewer San Jose residents, 14.9%, report binge or heavy drinking in contrast to 18% of the U.S. population. The city has slightly fewer drug overdose deaths per 100,000 people than the national average.

According to SmartAsset, the median household income in San Jose is $136,229, and 33% of households earn $200,000 or more per year.

Where do other California metros rank America's healthiest cities?

San Francisco ranked seventh out of 100 in SmartAsset's study. San Franciscans reported an average of 2.84 physically unhealthy days per 30 days and 4.82 mentally unhealthy days per 30 days.

Oakland ranked eight out of 100 in SmartAsset's study. San Franciscans reported an average of 2.99 physically unhealthy days per 30 days and 5.07 mentally unhealthy days per 30 days.

Anaheim ranked 10th out of 100 in SmartAsset's study. San Franciscans reported an average of 3.09 physically unhealthy days per 30 days and 4.47 mentally unhealthy days per 30 days.

New Orleans is the unhealthiest city

Taking the title from Detroit, New Orleans’ ranking was influenced by the worst rate of drug overdose deaths at 72.45 per 1,000 residents, as well as the worst rate of poor mental health days (6.5 per 30). It also ranked particularly low for average amount of sleep (97th), diabetes prevalence (97th), and excessive drinking (95th).

What are the healthiest cities in the US?

Here are the top 10 healthiest cities in America, according to SmartAsset's rankings:

Click here to view SmartAsset's full rankings and methodology.

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The legendary Capital Club is saying adieu to Silicon Valley.

The exclusive club that drew the who’s who of San Jose to network, party and plan the city’s future will close its doors on New Year’s Eve. The 34-year-old club announced the closure on Tuesday in a letter to its members, explaining the decision “reflects the current circumstances that have affected our operations in the post-COVID-era.”

The letter also said the club’s last day concludes its lease with The Jay Paul Company, which owns the building in downtown San Jose and did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The club was founded in 1990 and offers rooftop views of downtown San Jose, paired with platters of tender prime New York steak and martinis. It will be replaced by software company The Trade Desk, which will rent the roughly 17,000 square feet the club occupies on the 17th floor at 50 W. San Fernando St., according to the Mercury News.

@sanjosespotlight

The legendary Capital Club is saying adieu to Silicon Valley. The exclusive club that drew the who’s who of San Jose to network, party and plan the city’s future will close its doors on New Year’s Eve. San José Spotlight spoke to staff and members about why the club was so special. Read the full story at SanJoseSpotlight.com. #sanjose #siliconvalley #capitalclub

♬ original sound – San José Spotlight

Nicole Lecheler, Capital Club director of membership and member experience, said the club’s management is grateful for the community’s support over the years.

“It has been an honor to be a part of so many memorable experiences, and we are grateful for the relationships we’ve built along the way,” she told San José Spotlight. “We remain proud of what we’ve accomplished together, and we wish everyone the best in their future endeavors.”

Larry Stone, a longtime member and Santa Clara County tax assessor, joined the club about six months after it first opened its doors. He pays about $260 a month in membership fees and said one of his favorite memories was when he dined there with former President Bill Clinton, who was in town for former San Jose Mayor and U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norm Mineta’s celebration of life.

But Stone said the club has gone downhill in recent years, with membership declining and constant changes in management. He said one of the club’s premier spots, The Founder’s Room, has been closed for months. The club has also been accused of unfair wages.

“My wife and I had been there where there was only another couple there,” Stone told San José Spotlight. “You go to those particular clubs, you know, because of the camaraderie.”

Some club members said they feel left in the dark about the decision.

Former San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales, who joined the club in 2003 and sits on its board, said management didn’t communicate the impending closure at the recent board meetings he attended. He said he’s shocked by the decision and wishes the club’s parent company — Texas-based Invited Clubs — had reached out to individual members who could have helped out. He said membership was increasing after losing about half the club’s members during the height of the pandemic.

Invited Clubs did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Gonzales said his favorite dish from the menu has been the lobster roll. He’s most worried about the employees who will lose their jobs, but added there’s a business opportunity for someone to offer a place for club members to gather again after the closure.

“The Capital Club is more than a membership organization. It’s a family there,” he told San José Spotlight. “We watch people mature through their careers and lives and become very close friends.”

The Capital Club has been a space where renowned business leaders rub shoulders. After the closure, there won’t be a similar location in downtown San Jose to strike deals while looking out the city skyline.

Leah Toeniskoetter, CEO of the San Jose Chamber of Commerce, said the closure is a shame. She held her first chamber event there three weeks into her tenure and said there’s nothing like it.

“The Capital Club has been a center of networking, of business activity, of just lunch and relationships for so long,” she told San José Spotlight. “We’re really disheartened. It’s a beautiful space.”

The club will host a New Year’s Eve dinner beginning at 6 p.m. followed by a masquerade ball from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m.

Story updated Dec. 4 at 4:44 p.m. Original story published Dec. 4 at 10:11 a.m.

Contact Annalise Freimarck at [email protected] or follow @annalise_ellen on X, formerly known as Twitter.

For most students, a high school diploma signifies a step into their future. For Ibrahim Barrie, who is hard of hearing and diagnosed with a special learning disability, his recent diploma from Leigh High School in San Jose stopped his future in its tracks, he and his family say.

Ibrahim’s hearing condition and special learning disability are documented in his individualized education plan, or IEP, with the school. An IEP is a legal document a school follows so a student with certain disabilities can receive personalized education.

Two days before his graduation in June 2024, his mother, Isatu Barrie, says she received a phone call from Santa Clara County Office of Education’s (SCCOE) special education principal.

“She’s like, ‘I have bad news…I’ve been trying to fight it. I spoke with the [county] lawyers,’” Isatu said. “‘Ibrahim is not getting any certificate of completion. He’s getting a diploma.’”

A high school certificate or certificate of completion is something a student receives when he or she finishes high school but does not meet all the requirements to graduate. Ibrahim and his mother were expecting that certificate because they say it would have enabled him to receive services through the county to attend post-secondary adult school. The program would provide additional life skills and vocational training. Ibrahim’s dream is to work with automobiles, he says.

However, according to SCCOE’s letter to the family, the diploma meant Ibrahim was now “no longer eligible for special education services through the District of SCCOE.”

California 29 mins ago

San Jose 1 hour ago

“I was scared because if I don’t go to the adult school program, what am I going to do for my future,” Ibrahim signed in an interview with the NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit.

College isn’t an option he says. Even though school officials wrote that he earned a high school diploma, there’s a problem.

Ibrahim says he struggles with basic reading.

“The system failed him…How can an 18-year-old read at a second-grade level?” he mother said.

And how can a high school student who only reads at a second-grade level have a high school transcript filled with A’s and B’s?

One of Ibrahim’s former Leigh High School teachers agreed to speak with the Investigative Unit. She asked to remain anonymous to avoid retaliation.

“We failed him,” she said. “Having worked with him, I know that. I know that he’s reading at a 2^nd, 3^rd grade level.”

According to the Santa Clara County Office of Education’s letter to Ibrahim and his mother, school officials decided to issue him a diploma based on his IEP documents, assessment reports and other factors.

With his mother’s permission, NBC Bay Area shared several of those same documents with two separate special education advocates who do not know Ibrahim. They say they found red flags.

“[Ibrahim] was indicated to have passed Algebra 1, but when looking at the assessment results, it looks like he was only testing around a fourth-grade level at most for math,” said Taylor Kohn with Aspire Advocacy. “I would be curious to know how a young man who's only testing at a fourth grade level passed Algebra 1.”

Advocates Taylor Kohn and Alicia Tucker say school administrators seem to be looking mainly at Ibrahim’s transcript, and not at Ibrahim.

“When you see a transcript, you see the name of a class and a letter grade. You do not see anything additional like modifications happening which are noted in the IEP,” Kohn said.

With an IEP, Kohn and Tucker say, classes are adjusted. Ibrahim’s performance baseline was different from his peers. For instance, if earning an A grade in English typically means being able to read a novel, for Ibrahim, it doesn’t mean the same thing. A teacher is directed by Ibrahim’s IEP to pass him if he meets his own individualized baseline.

“His goal may be just to write two sentences towards a topic. And if he masters those goals, he makes an A in his class,” said Tucker.

The problem is, those A’s and B’s Ibrahim earned for his modified lesson plans ended up on his transcript. The fact that the classes were modified didn’t always, according to the Investigative Unit’s review of Ibrahim’s documents.

Tucker says most of his teachers probably were not aware the grades they gave him would results in denied services after graduation. She says she’s seeing this problem with special education students nationwide.

“Because of the lack of funding and the teacher shortage,” Tucker said. “They're just forgotten. They're overlooked.”

Ibrahim says he’s sharing his story for those students.

“I will like them to be supported, teach them, help them no matter what so they don't struggle in the real life because if they do, they will be...homeless,” he said.

Being homeless. Tearfully, Ibrahim said that is his biggest fear.

NBC Bay Area reached out to Leigh High School and SCCOE school leaders. They declined interviews. SCCOE provided a statement saying federal law “restricts [its] ability to disclose specific details about any student’s educational experiences or conversations related to their education.”

The county office has offered Ibrahim four years of adult school, transportation and sign language services. He and his mother would have to sign a contract agreeing that he earned the diploma and is no longer entitled to any further special education, including an IEP, while at adult school. Ibrahim and his mother have not signed the contract because they do not agree with the conditions.

For six months now, Ibrahim has been at home regressing, his mother says, receiving no vocational school or training to be a mechanic.

A former South Bay student says he was given a high school diploma that he didn't earn. He says it’s now causing him to be denied the services he needs. Raj Mathai speaks with Candice Nguyen on this.

Candice Nguyen is the investigative reporter on this story. If you have a questions or another investigative tip, email her at [email protected].

A massive earthquake ruptured off California’s coast on this morning, briefly triggering a tsunami warning for the coast of Northern California and southern Oregon.

The earthquake, a magnitude-7.0 temblor, rumbled at around 10:44am, about 42 miles west of Ferndale, California, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The quake damaged homes and utilities in Humboldt County, and was felt in San Francisco, Pacifica and in communities along the San Mateo and Santa Cruz County coast.

After the warning, the San Francisco Zoo was closed and some schools along the coast and the east bay were evacuated.

The tsunami warning was issued for the coast between from Davenport to the border between Douglas and Lane counties in Oregon. The Tsunami Warning Center canceled the warning at about 11:55am.

Humboldt County, the community on land closest to the epicenter, reported no injuries or fatalities so far, but county officials reported broken water mains, broken windows and houses off their foundation

About 10,000 people were without power in Humboldt County, according to NBC News.

The Lost Coast Outpost, a local news site, reported a “mass exodus from low-lying areas in Eureka and Arcata.”

“Traffic was really thick on the highway and through Eureka’s side streets,” the news site reported. “It was a good drill for The Big One. This was not The Big One.”

Earthquakes can trigger tsunamis when they displace the seafloor, causing waves that can rush toward shore. A tsunami warning indicates that significant inundation and coastal flooding is expected, based on preliminary information about the quake’s position.

Harold Tobin, the director of the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network, told media that the 7.0-magnitude temblor was a strike-slip earthquake. Strike-slip earthquakes take place when two plates slide past one another.

The quake ruptured in the Mendocino fault zone, at the intersection of three tectonic plates – the Pacific, North American and Juan de Fuca plates.

“This is the exact point where the Cascadia Subduction Zone ends to the south and the San Andreas Fault begins,” Tobin said in a statement to NBC News. “It’s the most seismically active place in California, overall, over the past decades. It’s not a surprise to get an earthquake of this magnitude.”

Tobin said this was the highest-magnitude earthquake produced in the area since the 1990s.

Tobin said the earthquake did not take place on the Cascadia Subduction Zone and that it was not likely to increase the risk of an earthquake there.

The Cascadia Subduction Zone is one of the biggest hazards in the U.S. The fault runs offshore along U.S. West Coast from Northern California to northern Vancouver Island. It's capable of producing magnitude-9.0 earthquakes and tsunami waves about 100 feet tall.

Over 30 aftershocks follow 7.0 magnitude temblor on the North Coast

2:05 p.m.

A series of powerful aftershocks rattled California’s North Coast on Thursday following a massive 7.0 offshore earthquake. The aftershocks, ranging in magnitude from 2.5 to 4.7, struck over a span of about two hours, keeping locals on edge.

A review of data from the United States Geological Survey indicates the strongest aftershock, a 4.7 magnitude tremor, hit at 10:46 a.m. This was one of many aftershocks that hit throughout the day, with the majority clustered within 10-40 miles of Petrolia.

Notably, the majority of the aftershocks occurred within the first hour of the main earthquake, with at least 10 of them recorded between 10:44 and 11:44 a.m. The tremors were felt across a wide area, including nearby Ferndale.

'Minimal' damage reported near the epicenter of Thursday's quake

12:55 p.m.

SFGATE reached out to emergency services from Ferndale and Rio Dell, the two North Coast towns closest to the epicenter of Thursday’s 6.6 magnitude earthquake, to assess the impact.

Lt. Clint Michel of the Ferndale Volunteer Fire Department reported the damage in Ferndale is “very minimal.” By 12:30 p.m., firefighters had found no structural damage to the town’s buildings, though some homes experienced items being tossed about during the quake. Michel added that fire personnel encountered a lot of “scared people” in the immediate aftermath.

Rio Dell Fire Department Assistant Chief Ryan Heussler gave a similar update, saying, “We’ve got units out, and I’m pleased to report that damage is minimal. It was a rapid assessment, and everything looks pretty good. We’re happy to report that.” He noted that a few stores were closed, “because there might be a mess inside.”

Operations at Alcatraz briefly suspended

12:30 p.m.

Operations at San Francisco's Alcatraz Island were briefly suspended Thursday after the National Weather Service issued a tsunami warning for much of Northern California.

The warning, which was sent to phones and appeared on web browsers, came after a preliminary magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit some 60 miles off Ferndale in Humboldt County. The warning was canceled roughly an hour later after the weather service said the tsunami threat had passed.

According to Cornelius Geary, a spokesperson for Alcatraz City Cruises, the roughly 200 guests on the island when the alert hit were told to shelter in place until the threat had passed. As of Thursday afternoon, operations had resumed and guests were able to take a ferry back to Pier 33.

According to the United States Geological Survey, the earthquake struck at a depth of roughly 10 kilometers at 10:44 a.m. No damage or injuries were immediately reported, the USGS said.

‘Nothing to see’: SF officials urged people to leave Ocean Beach

12:15 p.m.

Emergency officials in San Francisco used trucks and loudspeakers to warn residents to leave San Francisco’s beaches Thursday following a tsunami warning. At Ocean Beach, emergency personnel drove on both the Great Highway and the beach telling residents to head to higher ground. Justin Schorr, a rescue captain for the San Francisco Fire Department, said that anywhere within one mile of the coastline was considered at risk for a tsunami.

The National Weather Service later issued an update at approximately noon that “THERE IS NO LONGER A TSUNAMI THREAT FROM THIS EARTHQUAKE.”

Residents had congregated at the beach throughout the tsunami warning despite officials urging them to leave. Schorr said prior to the warning being lifted that people should head to higher ground by following “the predetermined evacuation routes that are posted in communities.”

“Please stay away from the coastline, there is nothing to see at the beach,” Schorr told SFGATE.

Magnitude 7.0 earthquake hits off California coast

10:57 a.m.

A preliminary magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit some 60 miles off Ferndale in Humboldt County late Thursday morning, according to the United States Geological Survey. In the aftermath of the shaking, the National Weather Service issued a tsunami warning, urging Californians to "get away from coastal waters."

"Tsunami warnings mean that a tsunami with significant inundation is expected or occurring," the California Office of Emergency Services said "Warnings indicate that widespread dangerous coastal flooding accompanied by powerful currents are possible and may continue for several hours after the initial wave arrival."

Tsunami Warning 1 for areas of OR & N. CA: See https://t.co/npoUHxX900 for alert areas. M7.3 045mi SW Eureka, California 1044PST Dec 5 pic.twitter.com/NFCbU5EaKa

— NWS Tsunami Alerts (@NWS_NTWC) December 5, 2024

The warning extends from Davenport, Calif., about 10 miles northwest of Santa Cruz, to the Douglas-Lane county line in Oregon, about 10 miles southwest of Florence.

The first waves are expected to arrive at 12:10 p.m. for San Francisco Bay Area, Karleisa Rogacheski, a meteorologist for the weather service told SFGATE. In areas farther north, such as Fort Bragg, the waves could come sooner, she said. Rogacheski said the weather service is still assessing the wave heights and severity, but advised people to stay away from the water. She said the warning is different from an advisory, because a warning indicates that "impacts are expected to occur."

"Stay away from the waters. Don't go out looking for the tsunami," she said. "We don't want people to get caught off in stuff offshore."

The San Francisco Department of Emergency Management advised those near the coast to move to higher ground or inland areas until officials say it's safe to return. "A series of powerful waves and strong currents may impact coasts near you. You are in danger," the agency said in a social media post.

TSUNAMI WARNING IN EFFECTWe are still waiting for magnitudes of water rise.We will update you as we learn more#CAwx https://t.co/TC6X4cNbtU

— NWS Bay Area ???? (@NWSBayArea) December 5, 2024

Once the waves hit the area, Rogacheski said the weather service will have more updates.

The earthquake struck at a depth of about 10 kilometers at approximately 10:44 a.m. A series of aftershocks have also rattled far Northern California after the initial 7.0 magnitude quake. No damage or injuries were immediately reported, the USGS said. BART temporarily stopped all trains from using the Transbay Tube but resumed regular service shortly before noon.

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