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That may sound like winning the “least corrupt” award in Chicago.

And, admittedly, it’s hard to ignore the dreary, gray skies, the towering piles of old, dirty snow and the whipping winds blowing around all the snow that’s been dumped on us of late.

But it turns out that Buffalo is a sunny place. Really.

Buffalo won the 2008 Sunshine Derby, a contest featured daily on The Buffalo News’ weather page that tracks the number of days with 50 percent or more sunshine during daytime hours in Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse.

Buffalo clocked an impressive 167 days in the derby, beating out Syracuse by three sunshine-filled days. Rochester logged just 56 days.

Buffalo even beat out Orlando, also included in the Sunshine Derby, which had just 119 sunny days. But, of course, Buffalo paled in comparison to dry and arid Phoenix, also in the derby, which enjoyed 251 sunny days.

“I’m pleasantly surprised, to say the least,” said Ed Healy, spokesman for the Buffalo Niagara Convention and Visitors Bureau, who is more used to finding creative ways of convincing potential tourists that Buffalo doesn’t always look like a snow globe trapped on an overactive blender.

“Maybe we’re going to have to start making more of that,” he said of Buffalo’s new honor.

He pitched a possible new slogan: “Come to Buffalo, the land of sunshine.”

Dave Sage, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Buffalo office, was thrilled and filled with pride over his town’s climatological claim.

“It puts Buffalo in a better light considering all the blizzard jokes we hear on the nighttime shows,“ he said, explaining that as a weather professional, he knows that Buffalo’s weather isn’t anywhere near as bad as its national reputation. “I would say as long as we rank ahead of the other cities, it’s good.”

The Sunshine Derby is tabulated by James Piro, climatology coordinator for State College, Pa.-based weather company Accuweather.

Piro bases his results on statistics compiled by the National Weather Service.

Piro uses one of two figures — the amount of possible sunshine per day for each region or the average sky cover for a day — and sometimes both of those stats, to make his final determination on whether a given day qualifies.

“That’s fairly accurate,” Piro said.

He said Rochester’s dismal showing in 2008 may not be as bad as it sounds. The entire region experienced higher-than-average precipitation during the year, making for lots of cloudy and partly cloudy days.

Piro said Rochester likely had a number of days with just under 50 percent sunshine, which put it at its miserable position.

Close followers of the Sunshine Derby may notice that from time to time the figures will change. Piro said that’s because the stats are compiled in the late afternoon using preliminary forecasting data available, before the entire period of daylight is over during the summer.

“So sometimes, what will happen is the numbers fluctuate,” he said.

He added that he generally doesn’t get complaints about the change in figures.

“The only occasional phone call we get is from The Buffalo News,” he said.

mbecker@buffnews.com

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