POLS 207 Chapter 8 Reading Notes 10 21 2014 Local Gov Money o Revenue Sources 5 from federal 33 from state 62 from other sources Property sales tax Utilities o Spending 42 on education Public safety fire police 30 Previous to WWII cities paid County Gov o Oldest local gov Provide Maintain property records Provide public health care Maintaining rural roads o Commissioners Land owners to protect their land Municipal government o Mayor Council Form Mayor heads executive brand City Council legislative branch Checks and Balances Not Bicameral but still check each other Policy making by competition Best satisfies executive and legislative o Council Manager Form No partisan way to provide services Used in majority of less than 250 000 population Professional rather than party based City manager school superintendent in charge Must play a balancing act between two sides o Town Meeting Form Eligible students act as the legislative body Representative government merged with direct democracy Bad for large municipalities o Commission Form City Commission Legislative and executive roles in one institution Portland last Commission School Government o Independent School districts are in decline Special Districts o Continue to increase o Provide Fire Protection Mosquito Abatement Public transit Water supply The Urban Machine and Reform o New services needed that existing governments were unwilling to provide o Reform Movement Intended mainly to disable the machines and return power to right people Secret Ballot Machines could no longer see who was voted for Nonpartisan elections Candidates not identifiable by a party level Difficult for those with weaker literacy immigrants to know who were Machine candidates Merit System Public jobs have job descriptions and associated competency tests Disabled Machine s from awarding supporters public jobs Strong Mayor Gave mayor more control Clarified who was responsible for Gov actions Short ballot reform Fewer officials to elect At Large Elections City Council members elected from citywide Used to defeat Machines Deny minorities the representation on city elections councils Registration and Citizenship Reduced the votes available to machines o City Home Rule Specifies that Dillon s rule does not apply to a particular Allowed to shape its government without legislative city approval Metropolitan Difficulties o Explosion of movement after WWII o Automobiles made it possible to live in suburbs o Rural areas didn t have common services o Fragmented Governments Numerous but insufficiently large Inadequate municipal services provided at high cost o Solutions Consolidation Fragmented municipal governments and the central city were a single county Special districts More people to deal with a problem Democracy in local government o Local elections Incumbents overwhelmingly win o Volunteers o Competition Typically become city Council participants Civic Duty No correlation to increased turnout Comparing Local Government Impact of Institutions on Democracy at Grass Roots o Single member districts give minorities better representation o Non partisan elections have more African American representatives 10 21 2014 10 21 2014
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