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You'll probably get a lot of reasonable, well-informed advice to look toward the bigger cities and their better suburbs.
But since you've a family, presumably with kids, I'd very much recommend smaller towns. Ithaca comes first to mind. As a college town, arts center, etc., it's famously tolerant in the best senses of the word. However, it is kind of pricey--at least by upstate NY standards. A nice 3 or 4 bedroom home could cost you $250,000 or more, though of course both less and more expensive homes are available. The property taxes are pretty high, but the schools and services are excellent.
A town very near Ithaca--Trumansburg--impressed us a lot by all the black & white kids playing serenely together, in a very classic, quaintly small-town setting. It seems to have a great mix of small-town feel and enlightened respect for citizens of whatever color and background.
Some other college towns to consider would be Clinton and Hamilton. These are somewhat stuffier than Ithaca, but very civilized places, too. Pricey, but, again, very good services.
I'd recommend college towns generally because of the mix of people naturally in a college town, and such a place's working ethic of learning and thoughtfulness. (This doesn't mean that non-college-towns are bigoted, just that college towns tends to be more obviously open-minded.) Less expensive, smaller, less stately but still very live-able alternative college towns would be Geneseo, Fredonia, and Alfred. These are considerably westward of Ithaca, Clinton, and Hamilton, but you get much more for your housing dollar there, and you're closer to Rochester, Buffalo, and all that Ontario offers. (Toronto is NYC done right!) And even in such smallish towns, you've got such a tradition of immigrants around you that you can always get truly tasty food, and an ethic of inclusion generally prevails. These places are an amazing examples of how immigrants and traditional American customs have woven a tapestry together. I always loved the fund-raisers to help out the volunteer fire departments--complete with great calzones and parogis!
Cooperstown & Skaneateles are also very fine places, with Cooperstown the easier-going of the two. (Skaneateles can be a *bit* on the snooty side, though has to do more with money than race, from what we've seen.)
All of these places are very, very much family-oriented, and you'll have a lot of family-outing options in any of them, with beautiful contryside, camping, fishing, swimming, hiking, etc., all around you. And if your kids are college-bound, you still can't beat NY state's State University system for great choices on a great deal on a great education.
One caution about the college towns: Try to avoid buying in an area where a lot of college students live off-campus. Come Thur-Sat nights, the drinking, vandalism, and even violence in such areas can be shocking. All of these places have better-behaved students than where we live (in Blacksburg, VA, where Virginia Tech is located), but you won't want your family subjected to this if you can avoid it. The nice thing here, though, is that in each of these NY state college towns I've listed, the student areas *are* quite obvious and easy to avoid. Here, by contrast, you can't escape them--which is why we're going back to an upstate NY town/village ASAP!
Best of luck on your move!
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Looking for Inexpensive, Racially Tolerant Town in NY
SE Rochester
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