In 2010, Topeka was named No. 10 on the Kiplinger’s Personal Finance list of “Top 10 Cities for the Next Decade.” The magazine cited the quality schools, friendly people, good hospitals, university low housing costs among the reasons for Topeka’s selection.

In an April Fools’ Day joke, Google renamed itself “Topeka” for a day on April 1, 2010. The stunt mirrored Topeka renaming itself “Google, Kansas” for the month of March, 2010 in an effort to gain the software giant’s attention while bidding for high-speed internet service.

Kansas moved up to No. 10 from No. 15 on the 2009 Forbes “Best States for Business” rankings.

Topeka/Shawnee County received a $500,000 matching grant from the National Institutes of Standards and Technology (NIST)/Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) to help stimulate economic growth, innovation and entrepreneurship in the area.

The Topeka housing market was featured in USA Today as one of the nation’s strongest housing markets. In January, 2010, NBC’s Today Show named Topeka the third-best city to buy a house.

Kansas was ranked No. 3 in the nation for workforce development programs by Area Development Magazine.

PETA ranked Topeka No. 6 in its list of most vegetarian and vegan-friendly small cities in America.

In its annual 2010 rankings, Business Facilities magazine ranked Kansas in the top 10 in eight categories, including economic growth potential (10), quality of life (3), employment leaders (5) and best education climate (3). In addition, Topeka was one of the magazine’s seven “Editors’ Location Picks” for communities that caught their eye with sparkling innovation and steadfast growth. They also ranked Topeka No. 6 in Top 10 Metro Areas for Cost of Living in their Sixth Annual Rankings Report in their August, 2010 issue.

Custom Tree Care, Inc. of Topeka was honored for making the 2009 Inc. 500 list from Inc. magazine, which recognizes the 500 fastest growing private companies in the nation.

Readers Digest named Kansas’ highways the best in the nation.

Topeka was named one of America’s best places to live by Livability.com.

Kansas ranks number seven for the second straight year in “The Pollina Corporate Top Ten Pro-Business States.” The study evaluates and ranks states based on 33 factors including taxes, human resources, right-to-work legislation, energy costs, infrastructure spending, workers compensation laws, economic incentive programs and state economic development efforts.

Stormont-Vail HealthCare became the newest member of the Midwest Cancer Alliance (MCA) Partners Advisory Board, joining a network of leading hospitals and research institutions across the region that are advancing the pursuit of National Cancer Institute (NCI) designation.

Washburn University School of Business was named an outstanding business school by The Princeton Review.

St Francis Health Center ranked among the top five percent in the nation for emergency medicine, according to an independent study of patient outcomes released for the first time by HealthGrades. They also received the American College of Cardiology Foundation’s NCDR ACTION Registry-GWTG Gold Performance Achievement Award for 2009—one of only 120 hospitals to do so—recognizing their commitment to implementing higher standards of care for heart attack patients.