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I removed this text because I find "local government" to be used quite frequently to describe big-city governments. -- Beland 17:57, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
I've taken the plunge and just about completely rewritten the article. I don't claim that it's now perfect, but it's hopefully a huge improvement. It's certainly a lot more cohesive in my view.
I've excised a lot of stuff, particularly the various examples of local government from different states. I don't think that it makes sense to detail all fifty-one jurisdictions, which is where this article seemed to be headed; just a few exemplars are needed in my view. There are (or should be) separate articles for each of the states, which is where most of the detail belongs.
PS: I think I was saving my changes at the same time as someone else made some alterations. Apologies to the other person, but after all that writing I was too tired out to carefully review things further (and it's very hot and stuffy where I am at the moment!).
Silverhelm 21:58, 8 June 2006 (UTC).
Do the Grand Divisions of Tennessee operate as local governments? If so, we should say so and describe their functions, with a source. If not, what is the point of even mentioning them in this article? Thanks. Doctor Whom ( talk) 00:10, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
The section on individual states needs to be pared down. First, it should not be a trivia section; most states' systems of local government do not stand out that much. Second, long, detailed discussions of particular states should be broken out into new articles, with references added. I have tagged the article accordingly. Doctor Whom ( talk) 12:13, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
Daniel Danny John was here Doctor Whom: what reliable source are you referring to?
Anyhow: see the article on New England towns for more information. "Towns" and "cities" in New England are both incorporated municipalities, operating as governments on the same level of structure (but according to different internal models). In Massachusetts, which is what I'm most familiar with, several municipalities with a city form of government refer to themselves officially as "towns"; the "city" form of goverment didn't even exist until the 1820s, so even Boston was legally a "town" until then—so the "the historical circumstances of their formation", whatever they are, are the same for cities as for towns. But in any case, this article is about local government, not Census Bureau classification, and from a governmental perspective, New England towns and cities are both municipal governmental units of the same type. (Alternatively, they could both be listed under "township governments", since cities as well as towns are "areas into which a county is divided".) AJD ( talk) 20:44, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
It states: "although the took things outvaries [sic] from state to state, typical examples include the city, town, borough, and village." I'm not sure what it's supposed to say. Maybe: "although the local government varies from state to state..."? Melofshanoah ( talk) 20:43, 22 October 2010 (UTC)Melofshanoah Melofshanoah ( talk) 20:43, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
As county governments are already fully discussed in the Local government in the United States article, the County government in the United States article is redundant. Strongly suggest merging the county government article with Local government in the United States. 71.139.153.191 ( talk) 01:32, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
>> Detroit Bankruptcy Prods Cities to Target Pensions: Muni Credit( Lihaas ( talk) 19:26, 11 March 2014 (UTC)).
The US, being a dual sovereign system, each state gets to define what its local governments are. The US Census, as a unit of the sovereign federal government gets to put out its own definition. The 51 definitions do not agree which means that unless you qualify who is doing the counting, your government counts are going to be wrong. At present (and I've looked for it) there is no comprehensive listing of all governments in the USA. TMLutas ( talk) 22:07, 30 March 2015 (UTC)
"Texas does not have townships" Is this correct? I always thought The Woodlands, TX was a township? Since I'm not an expert on the intricacies, I'll throw it in the Talk instead of an edit. 216.227.244.219 ( talk) 15:46, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
[...] there is hereby created and established within Montgomery County, Texas, in the form and manner hereinafter set forth, a special district, to be known as the Town Center Improvement District of Montgomery County, Texas, [...]
[...] The name of the district may be changed by resolution of the board of directors of the district at any time. [...]
[...] The legislature ratifies and confirms all governmental acts and proceedings of The Woodlands Township and its board and of The Woodlands Township Economic Development Zone and its governing body before the effective date of this Act, in: [...] changing the name of the district to The Woodlands Township; [...]
The Town Center Improvement District (TCID) was created in 1993 by the Texas Legislature as a governmental agency charged with promoting economic development in The Woodlands Town Center, a 1,000-acre business and commerce district. In January 2010, all of these entities came together under one governmental organization called The Woodlands Township.
What is the background that made many states (e.g. California) to require municipal government to be nonpartisan? – Kaihsu ( talk) 18:26, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
There appears to be no reigning naming convention on the different article names, such as the difference of Administrative divisions of Alaska, with Local government in California, should one be adopted? Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 23:44, 16 November 2016 (UTC)
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As of 2017-10-28, the article claims "there were 89,004 local government units in the United States", and cited a page ( 2012 http://www.census.gov/govs/cog2012) that says, "Sorry, the page you requested has either been moved or is no longer available on this server." (It's officially not a broken link, which is why a bot didn't catch it.)
With a little more searching, I found https://www2.census.gov/govs/cog/g12_org.pdf, which reported that there were "90,106 state and local governments ... in existence [in the US] on June 30, 2012."
I don't feel I can afford the time now to try to revise the article with this in mind, especially since this is far from my area of expertise. However, I hope that this comment will help someone more competent than I make appropriate changes. It's clearly important, because this article has averaged 370 page views per day over the past 90 days, and the plot suggests a steady increase from roughly 270 per day 90 days ago.
Thank you to all who helped bring the article to this point. DavidMCEddy ( talk) 04:32, 29 October 2017 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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I removed this text because I find "local government" to be used quite frequently to describe big-city governments. -- Beland 17:57, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
I've taken the plunge and just about completely rewritten the article. I don't claim that it's now perfect, but it's hopefully a huge improvement. It's certainly a lot more cohesive in my view.
I've excised a lot of stuff, particularly the various examples of local government from different states. I don't think that it makes sense to detail all fifty-one jurisdictions, which is where this article seemed to be headed; just a few exemplars are needed in my view. There are (or should be) separate articles for each of the states, which is where most of the detail belongs.
PS: I think I was saving my changes at the same time as someone else made some alterations. Apologies to the other person, but after all that writing I was too tired out to carefully review things further (and it's very hot and stuffy where I am at the moment!).
Silverhelm 21:58, 8 June 2006 (UTC).
Do the Grand Divisions of Tennessee operate as local governments? If so, we should say so and describe their functions, with a source. If not, what is the point of even mentioning them in this article? Thanks. Doctor Whom ( talk) 00:10, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
The section on individual states needs to be pared down. First, it should not be a trivia section; most states' systems of local government do not stand out that much. Second, long, detailed discussions of particular states should be broken out into new articles, with references added. I have tagged the article accordingly. Doctor Whom ( talk) 12:13, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
Daniel Danny John was here Doctor Whom: what reliable source are you referring to?
Anyhow: see the article on New England towns for more information. "Towns" and "cities" in New England are both incorporated municipalities, operating as governments on the same level of structure (but according to different internal models). In Massachusetts, which is what I'm most familiar with, several municipalities with a city form of government refer to themselves officially as "towns"; the "city" form of goverment didn't even exist until the 1820s, so even Boston was legally a "town" until then—so the "the historical circumstances of their formation", whatever they are, are the same for cities as for towns. But in any case, this article is about local government, not Census Bureau classification, and from a governmental perspective, New England towns and cities are both municipal governmental units of the same type. (Alternatively, they could both be listed under "township governments", since cities as well as towns are "areas into which a county is divided".) AJD ( talk) 20:44, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
It states: "although the took things outvaries [sic] from state to state, typical examples include the city, town, borough, and village." I'm not sure what it's supposed to say. Maybe: "although the local government varies from state to state..."? Melofshanoah ( talk) 20:43, 22 October 2010 (UTC)Melofshanoah Melofshanoah ( talk) 20:43, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
As county governments are already fully discussed in the Local government in the United States article, the County government in the United States article is redundant. Strongly suggest merging the county government article with Local government in the United States. 71.139.153.191 ( talk) 01:32, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
>> Detroit Bankruptcy Prods Cities to Target Pensions: Muni Credit( Lihaas ( talk) 19:26, 11 March 2014 (UTC)).
The US, being a dual sovereign system, each state gets to define what its local governments are. The US Census, as a unit of the sovereign federal government gets to put out its own definition. The 51 definitions do not agree which means that unless you qualify who is doing the counting, your government counts are going to be wrong. At present (and I've looked for it) there is no comprehensive listing of all governments in the USA. TMLutas ( talk) 22:07, 30 March 2015 (UTC)
"Texas does not have townships" Is this correct? I always thought The Woodlands, TX was a township? Since I'm not an expert on the intricacies, I'll throw it in the Talk instead of an edit. 216.227.244.219 ( talk) 15:46, 4 November 2015 (UTC)
[...] there is hereby created and established within Montgomery County, Texas, in the form and manner hereinafter set forth, a special district, to be known as the Town Center Improvement District of Montgomery County, Texas, [...]
[...] The name of the district may be changed by resolution of the board of directors of the district at any time. [...]
[...] The legislature ratifies and confirms all governmental acts and proceedings of The Woodlands Township and its board and of The Woodlands Township Economic Development Zone and its governing body before the effective date of this Act, in: [...] changing the name of the district to The Woodlands Township; [...]
The Town Center Improvement District (TCID) was created in 1993 by the Texas Legislature as a governmental agency charged with promoting economic development in The Woodlands Town Center, a 1,000-acre business and commerce district. In January 2010, all of these entities came together under one governmental organization called The Woodlands Township.
What is the background that made many states (e.g. California) to require municipal government to be nonpartisan? – Kaihsu ( talk) 18:26, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
There appears to be no reigning naming convention on the different article names, such as the difference of Administrative divisions of Alaska, with Local government in California, should one be adopted? Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 23:44, 16 November 2016 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Local government in the United States. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 02:31, 25 May 2017 (UTC)
As of 2017-10-28, the article claims "there were 89,004 local government units in the United States", and cited a page ( 2012 http://www.census.gov/govs/cog2012) that says, "Sorry, the page you requested has either been moved or is no longer available on this server." (It's officially not a broken link, which is why a bot didn't catch it.)
With a little more searching, I found https://www2.census.gov/govs/cog/g12_org.pdf, which reported that there were "90,106 state and local governments ... in existence [in the US] on June 30, 2012."
I don't feel I can afford the time now to try to revise the article with this in mind, especially since this is far from my area of expertise. However, I hope that this comment will help someone more competent than I make appropriate changes. It's clearly important, because this article has averaged 370 page views per day over the past 90 days, and the plot suggests a steady increase from roughly 270 per day 90 days ago.
Thank you to all who helped bring the article to this point. DavidMCEddy ( talk) 04:32, 29 October 2017 (UTC)