According to a nationwide survey released Aug. 11, three Bay Area cities are on the national top 10 most liberal list, including Berkeley at No. 3, Oakland at No. 5 and San Francisco at No. 9.

A study performed by the nonpartisan Bay Area Center for Voting Research, based in Berkeley, examined 237 cities with populations of more than 100,000 to see how conservative or liberal they are.

The methodology was simple: Republicans were considered conservative, and Democrats liberal, Jason Alderman, director of the center, said,.

"It was pretty clear-cut in the recent presidential election," he said.

Jennifer Busam of Los Gatos agreed that this might be a fair assumption, but wasn't so sure that it was as easy as one or the other.

Detroit, Mich., was found to be the most liberal city in the nation. Other Bay Area cities that ranked high on the liberal list were Daly City, Hayward, Vallejo, Santa Rosa, Sunnyvale and Fremont.

But just because parts of the Bay Area are liberal doesn't mean that all cities are alike.

While smaller towns and cities such as Los Gatos, Monte Sereno and Saratoga were not ranked, previous studies by the center concluded that out of 109 Bay Area cities, Monte Sereno is the fifth most Republican in the area, Saratoga is 10th and Los Gatos ranks 25th.

Atherton was found to have the most registered voters that are Republican, with 52.9 percent.

"I think conservatism has to do with wealth," Busam said.

Conversely, the city with the highest percentage of voters that are Democrats is Richmond, with 70.7 percent.

"We think of the South Bay as being really cutting edge, but it's clearly not as liberal as we thought," Alderman said. In the Aug. 11 study, San Jose was one of the Bay Area's more conservative cities, placing 74th on the liberal city list.

Los Gatos is pretty evenly split, with 39.2 percent registered Democrats during the 2004 presidential election and 38.9 percent Republicans.

"This just goes to show you that Los Gatos is the best of both worlds," Los Gatos Mayor Mike Wasserman said.

Monte Sereno is 35.3 percent Democrat and 46.3 percent Republican, which doesn't surprise Monte Sereno Mayor Curtis Wright one bit.

"We have a lot of retirees and CEOs. What surprises me is that only 46 percent are Republican," Wright said.

Saratoga is 31.7 percent Democrat and 43.3 percent Republican.

Although these numbers do not differ greatly, Alderman does notice a trend.

"Compared to the rest of the Bay Area, they are fairly conservative," he said.

Alderman said that one of the surprise findings in the survey was that cities with higher African American populations were more liberal, including Detroit, where more than 80 percent of the population is black.

The most conservative city, according to their findings, was Provo, Utah, where less than 1 percent of the population is black--about the same as Los Gatos. The African American population in Monte Sereno is 0.4 percent, and in Saratoga it is 0.5 percent.

While Busam said she was not surprised at the findings, she is hesitant to put all her "eggs in one basket."

"I'm not sure I'd equate African Americans with necessarily always being liberal," she said.

Although surveys might be helpful in getting a better understanding of voter trends, they are not always a sure bet.

"Whenever a study is done like this, you have to keep in mind who did the study, and how many places were sampled. It all depends on what perspective you come from," Wasserman said.

Busam agreed.

"I take them with a grain of salt," she said.