Houston has dropped out of the top slot in the Men’s Fitness "Fattest Cities" survey. That title now goes to Chicago:

Houston still ranks among America’s top 25 fattest cities but has relinquished the claim as the nation’s fattest city, the heavyweight title it netted in Men’s Fitness magazine’s 2005 ranking, to Chicago.

In the magazine’s 2006 ranking, Chicago moved up four spots from last year to reign large this year as the fattest city, while Houston, spurred on a bit by Houston Mayor Bill White, dropped some spots on the list to place at No. 5 in the 2006 ranking.

A day after Men’s Fitness dubbed Houston the fattest city last year, White initiated Get Moving Houston, a citywide program aimed at getting Houston off the list of fattest cities in 2006, according to the magazine. An avid bicyclist and runner, White helped Houston improve four sports by establishing a wellness council, and promoting the Tour de Houston, a bike race that raised funds benefiting Houston parks.

Yes, this was a worthy use of Bill White’s time and of government resources. Rather than tackling Houston’s burgeoning police shortage, White focused on erasing the stain of an arbitrary survey’s result.

I think Tory Gattis nails it:

Phoenix moves from 12th fattest to 15th fittest in one year? Atlanta moves from 23rd fattest to 16th fittest? Baltimore wins this year’s award for the fittest city, when they were 25th fattest last year? (not to mention ranked 93rd out of a 100 by rival Men’s Health) Do we believe some epidemic of fitness consciousness broke out in these cities? Half the Washington Post article makes fun of the result. It’s almost as if the magazine editors toyed with their judging criteria and formula until it got a winner no one believes - a sure fire way to get lots of free publicity, which, of course, is the point of doing these lightweight rankings anyway: to sell more magazines.

Yup, pure fluff. That’s what got Bill White worked into a frenzy.