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What type of set-up do you prefer and why? Which is the better system, economically as well as for the delivery of services? What are the drawbacks of both? Experiences and any other opinions welcome; particularly on incorporation vs unincorporation.
County Governments as they exist in the South and West where the services and schools are controlled by the county; cities are not independent (except a couple of cities like Baltimore, St. Louis and Virginia). Incorporation vs Un-incorporation is a thing.
Township system of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Michigan and other Northeast and Midwest places where the County only counts for courts and other relatively minor things but the schools are run by the township as is zoning and most local services. Unincorporation doesn't exist in this system. Cities exist under the county but are usually have home rule or something similar.
**I'll even throw in the Town system of the Northeast in places like Massachusetts and New York where the Counties matter even less than in the township system and all services are controlled by local entity.
I think an emphasis on larger incorporated entities (e.g. counties) helps ease segregation. I've heard this posited as a reason that Canadian metro areas are much less segregated than US ones: they tend to have a handful of large suburbs instead of a bunch of small ones, so any suburb will contain a diverse socioeconomic mixture. This means there's less incentive for affluent residents to try to move to an affluent enclave where they won't have to pay taxes to support the poor, so the area stays integrated. In the US, it certainly looks like the areas with the most municipalities (Chicago, LA, St. Louis, Pittsburgh) are some of the most segregated.
In general I'm in favor of bigger government entities anyway. I don't really like the school of thought that different cities/states should set their own political agendas, so you can move to somewhere that matches your beliefs --- it increases polarization, and in practice there will always be people who are screwed over by their local government but can't leave for whatever reason. Although one advantage of smaller entities is that it lets places try out different policies, thereby providing data that can be used to study their effects.
Southern New England has almost no county government. Schools and services are provided by the city/town and funded by local property taxes. Massachusetts subsidizes the low tax base cities and towns. The higher poverty rate cities typically get enough state money to fund 100% of their school budget. The state operates regional vocational-technical schools. The affluent suburbs tuition out any students who want to attend. The high poverty rate cities don’t have to pay.
This combined with zoning creates massive socioeconomic segregation. You get some very stark transitions from high poverty rate cities to white collar professional suburbia. Lawrence MA to Andover MA. Springfield MA to Longmeadow MA.
What type of set-up do you prefer and why? Which is the better system, economically as well as for the delivery of services? What are the drawbacks of both? Experiences and any other opinions welcome; particularly on incorporation vs unincorporation.
County Governments as they exist in the South and West where the services and schools are controlled by the county; cities are not independent (except a couple of cities like Baltimore, St. Louis and Virginia). Incorporation vs Un-incorporation is a thing.
Township system of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Michigan and other Northeast and Midwest places where the County only counts for courts and other relatively minor things but the schools are run by the township as is zoning and most local services. Unincorporation doesn't exist in this system. Cities exist under the county but are usually have home rule or something similar.
**I'll even throw in the Town system of the Northeast in places like Massachusetts and New York where the Counties matter even less than in the township system and all services are controlled by local entity.
The bolded isn't necessarily true, as some towns may have their own police department, as an example(towns like Manlius and Dewitt in the eastern suburbs of Syracuse come to mind). So, it may depend on the town.
I think an emphasis on larger incorporated entities (e.g. counties) helps ease segregation. I've heard this posited as a reason that Canadian metro areas are much less segregated than US ones: they tend to have a handful of large suburbs instead of a bunch of small ones, so any suburb will contain a diverse socioeconomic mixture. This means there's less incentive for affluent residents to try to move to an affluent enclave where they won't have to pay taxes to support the poor, so the area stays integrated. In the US, it certainly looks like the areas with the most municipalities (Chicago, LA, St. Louis, Pittsburgh) are some of the most segregated.
In general I'm in favor of bigger government entities anyway. I don't really like the school of thought that different cities/states should set their own political agendas, so you can move to somewhere that matches your beliefs --- it increases polarization, and in practice there will always be people who are screwed over by their local government but can't leave for whatever reason. Although one advantage of smaller entities is that it lets places try out different policies, thereby providing data that can be used to study their effects.
I think another positive aspect, depending on certain factors is representation. So, if you are a city that then gets consolidated into a joint city-county government, certain groups may feel that they aren't as represented if they are concentrated primarily within a city, whereas they feel more represented in a city form of government. This was a topic that has come up in the area I live in and has its pros and cons, depending on the lens you view the changes.
I think townships are obsolete in 2023. They made more sense in the 1880s when automobiles weren't a thing and a 6 mile journey to town was an all day event. They helped give folks more access to municipal governments. Nowadays especially from a metropolitan/regional standpoint, too many smaller governments can be prohibitive to growth and initiatives at a regional level, and ultimately turn away economic opportunity.
Michigan's townships in particular hold back its metropolitan areas from fully competing with their peers in other states. For instance the townships surrounding Grand Rapids tend to be cartoonishly NIMBY. A few of them have been battling the building of several large scale housing developments for years. This has created a pretty severe housing shortage and forced builders further and further out into exurbs and rural counties. It has slowed growth in the core urban area, and accelerated growth in surrounding rural counties. 10 years from now the result will be some pretty shameful sprawl outside of the urban area.
For Detroit, Michigan's 1947 Charter Township law gave the suburbs as much power as the core city. Since then any sort of regional initiative like rail transit (or even inter-city bus service) has been dead in the water. There are 140+ individual governments that make up Detroit's metro and they don't cooperate with each other. This lack of cooperation has lead to a lack of vision and regional identity. Consolidating some of these redundant governments would not only save tax payers money, but lead to a more cooperative region IMO
^I think you described why NY State doesn't have more people than it does now, as there are so many towns, villages and the big one is school districts, where there are 731 of the latter. it isn't ironic that school taxes make up the bigger portion of property taxes in the state. So, for some states, consolidation of school districts may be the thing that they really look at.
^I think you described why NY State doesn't have more people than it does now, as there are so many towns, villages and the big one is school districts, where there are 731 of the latter. it isn't ironic that school taxes make up the bigger portion of property taxes in the state. So, for some states, consolidation of school districts may be the thing that they really look at.
Agreed. 10 million person Michigan has 539 school districts. Many of them founded in congruence with townships. 22million person Florida has 69 school districts. I am certainly not advocating for Michigan to adopt Florida's education model, but there's no denying the level of redundancy in paying that many more super intendants, and administrators. That's not even considering the consolidation in buildings and other overhead. You are talking about potential billions of $ that could be redirected back into actual education.
The same could be said for the many redundant governments and services for each small township and city.
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