Municipal administration

“ This municipal assembly shall be the Council of Administration, which shall establish for the entire extent of its jurisdiction the rules of the common regime, and shall decide on all that concerns the municipal police, its internal security, sanitary policy, the management and use of municipal revenues, local expenditures, and generally all that is within the jurisdiction of the municipalities.
Art. 43. The active power shall be entirely, and for all the extent of the municipal district, in the hands of the mayor and his lieutenant, who shall be elected immediately by the primary assemblies. ”

“ In other parishes, municipal administrations shall be composed of a mayor and two administrators; a substitute commissary of the responsible tribunal shall hold the function of commissary near the municipality gratuitously.
Art. 49. Members of these municipal administrations shall be nominated for two years; they may always continue beyond that time. Their nomination devolves to the Governor, who, on a list of at least sixteen individuals, presented by each municipal administration, chooses the persons most appropriate to manage the affairs of each parish. ”

“ The city is organized, like the state government, on the plan of distributed powers and diffused responsibility. It contains, as a rule, an elaborate system of checks which affords little opportunity for the prompt and effective expression of local public opinion in the administration of municipal affairs. At the same time, it gives the municipal authorities power to inaugurate and carry out policies to which local public sentiment may be strongly opposed. This is seen in the control which the mayor and council quite generally exercise over the matter of municipal franchises. ”

“ The municipalities are in their area under their own responsibility the only public body responsible for the whole local public administration. They can take over any public duty if it is not by explicit legal regulation assigned exclusively to other bodies in urgent public interest.
(2) The municipal unions have within their legal responsibilities the same position.
(3) The right to self-administer their matters are provided to the municipalities and municipal unions by the state. The overseeing of the state is restricted to ensuring that the administration is in conformance with the laws. ”

“ If there is a corrupt council, the remedy is not its supersession by an independent executive. Such an executive is the abrogation of popular government. “Good and efficient government is possible under almost any form of organization. More depends upon men than devices.... But ... if we believe that the functions of deliberation or determination of municipal policy and of administration [Pg 63] or the execution or carrying out of that policy should be kept distinct, we cannot avoid the conclusion that a city council is a necessary part of the municipal organization.” ”

“ We are now on the eve of the first municipal election under the amended Constitution. The importance of the crisis is magnified by the fact that the municipal officers to be elected at the coming election will have the care of the business interests of the great municipality created by the new charter, their administration extending over a greatly enlarged territory, and their constituents being a population numbering upward of three millions of souls. The importance of the selection of proper officers for the management of the affairs of this imperial city cannot be exaggerated. ”

“ Whether the board of public works is also a part of and an agency of the municipal corporation is the question before us.
1. The authorities state, and our own knowledge is to the effect, that the care and superintendence of streets, alleys, and highways, the regulation of grades, and the opening of new and closing of old streets, are peculiarly municipal duties. No other power can so wisely and judiciously control this subject as the authority of the immediate locality where the work is to be done. ”

“ In some localities the inhabitants have met together and voluntarily formed a municipal organization for the purposes of local government, adopting the form of a municipal constitution and charter, under which said officials have been appointed; and ordinances creating and regulating a police force, a fire department, a department of health, and making provision for the care of the insane and indigent poor and sick and for public schools, have been passed. ”

“ With the new municipalities, a really autonomous and decentralized municipal government will be established in the towns, since no provincial assembly is created in the capitals of the provinces or districts, and each municipality is the legitimate administrator of the interests of its town, and will keep, preserve, and expend for the public welfare of the municipal funds. ”

“ The law names certain things which each city charter shall provide, and imposes certain restrictions on the powers of cities. There must be an elected Mayor and a body vested with legislative power; the clerk, treasurer, and assessors, and other officers may be elected or appointed. This permits the establishment of a commission system, or of a Mayor and council with distinct powers. Provision must be made for the levy, collection, and return of State, county, and school taxes, for annual appropriations for municipal purposes, and for a system of accounts. ”

“ The city government is vested in a mayor, elected every two years, a municipal council, and the usual administrative departments, all appointed by the executive, and all, excepting that of public works, where the power is given to a single head, governed by boards. ”

“ The government, as provided by the charter of 1867 and numerous amendments thereto, is vested in a mayor, who holds office for two years, and a common council, which elects all administrative officials, excepting the statutory municipal officers, who are chosen by popular vote. The city owns and operates the water-works. ”

“ To this end it seems to me desirable that when municipal offices are to be filled the discharge of the duties of which requires professional knowledge, skill and experience, the selection should be confined to professional men of good standing. Let us take for an example a department about which there may be some doubt in this respect, the department of public works, meaning the department which has in its charge the matter of drainage, of water supply, of street paving and similar things. It is certainly one of the most important branches of the municipal government. ”

“ It is a mistake to think lightly of the importance of municipal office, or of the responsibilities which are attached to it, either on the part of the citizen, who, as a member of the council, conducts the affairs of the town, or of the citizen who plays the part of taxpayer—and complainant in general. ”

“ People's councils of municipalities directly under the central authority, and of municipalities divided into districts may set up bureaux, divisions, committees or commissions to take charge of civil affairs, public security, justice, supervision, planning, finances, food, taxation, industry, commerce, labour, culture, education, public health, physical culture and sports, projects of municipal construction, and public services ”

“ It shall be proper for said cities to provide, by ordinance, for the exercise of all rights and powers herein conferred upon the City Planning Commission, by a park commission, or kindred municipal bureau or commission, authorized under existing laws. And no person holding office under the government of any of said cities, except the mayor, members of councils, or commissioners, shall be ineligible to serve as a member of a City Planning Commission. ”

“ The legal validity of any act by the city, such as the issuing of bonds, the contracting for a municipal waterworks or the granting of a municipal franchise, is not determined by the expressed desire of its citizens, but by the voice of the legislature as set out in some statute. The real seat of municipal authority, therefore, is not in the citizens, but in the state legislature; the city lives and moves and has its being in the will of the state. ”

“ The Provincial Councils and the City Councils are still functioning. The administrative framework of the country survives. The municipal organization, so solidly rooted, has not ceased to exercise power. ”

“ We need to recognize the importance, in city affairs as in private business, of securing officials who are qualified by training and by successful experience to serve the public. Economy and honesty in municipal government cannot be expected when politics alone determines appointments to office. The establishment of civil-service-examination systems in certain cities is a step in the right direction.
Public Utilities.—Besides the administrative departments already mentioned, we have in large cities those which control the supply of water, light, and transportation facilities. ”

“ The mayor shall have exclusive jurisdiction in all cases arising under the ordinances of the corporation, and shall issue such process as may be necessary to carry said ordinances into execution and effect, appeals may be had from any decision or judgment of said mayor, or aldermen, arising under the city ordinances, to the municipal court, under such regulations as may be presented by ordinance. ”

“ These are some of the tasks which cannot safely be intrusted to a municipality unless its government is above suspicion, unless men of probity and capacity are placed in power, unless the whole community extends its sympathy to the work and keeps a vigilant eye upon all the officials. Municipal governments cannot be encouraged to own public utilities so long as there is a risk that somebody may own municipal governments. ”

“ In some cities the mayor has received an absolute power of appointment; the departments, especially the boards of health, have large ordinance-making powers; statutes passed by the state legislature determine (excepting the states where cities can make their own charters) the principal lines of municipal policy, and the real control over appropriations and taxes is occasionally found vested in a board of estimate, consisting of the mayor, comptroller (the chief financial officer) , and a few other administrative officials. ”

“ We are told that municipal government should be divorced from politics, and this is doubtless true. A municipality is primarily a business or engineering corporation. Its main concern is with streets, sewers, parks and docks ”

“ But the municipality of Garden City, besides setting its face against any attempt to embark upon too large a field of enterprise, will so frame its constitution that the responsibility for each branch of the municipal service will be thrown directly upon the officers of that branch and not be practically lost sight of because loosely thrown upon the larger central body—a plan which makes it difficult for the public to perceive where any leakage or friction may be taking place. ”

“ A municipal corporation may act through its mayor, though its common council, or its legislative department by whatever name called, its superintendent of streets, commissioner of highways, or board of public works, provided the act is within the province committed to its charge. Nor can it in principle be of the slightest consequence by what means these several officers are placed in their position,-whether they are elected by the people of the municipality, or appointed by the President or a governor. The people are the recognized source of all authority, state and municipal ”

“ The Bureau of Municipal Research, admittedly the most practical organization of its kind in the country, is conducting its work along the line of effective competency in city departments. As a result of its investigations, the citizens of New York have been forced to the conclusion to which my colleague has already referred, namely, that the ultimate solution of their municipal difficulties will be reached only when they have disposed of their present inefficient and useless ward council and created in its place a commission council. ”

“ There are local interests peculiar to every town, whether great or small, and common to all its inhabitants; every town, therefore, without distinction of size, ought to have its municipal council. It is equally obvious that every town ought to have but one. The different quarters of the same town have seldom or never any material diversities of local interest; they all require to have the same things done, the same expenses incurred; and, except as to their churches, which it is probably desirable to leave under simply parochial management, the same arrangements may be made to serve for all. ”

“ Of these the most important was the Municipal Act, which gave local self-government to the villages, towns, townships and counties of Upper Canada. The people of each municipality could now manage such matters as building roads, bridges, jails and court-houses, through men elected for that purpose, and who were called councillors in villages, towns and townships, and aldermen in cities. ”

“ The municipality shall autonomously, in accordance with the Law, adopt its budget and annual balance sheet, the urban development plan and municipal development programme, establish the symbols of the municipality, as well as their use.
The municipality shall see to exercising, protection and improvement of human and minority rights, as well as to public informing in the municipality.
The municipality shall autonomously manage the municipal assets, in accordance with the Law. ”

“ The Urban District.—Of areas within which are administered the local affairs of the urban portions of the kingdom there are several of distinct importance, although in reality the institutions of urban government are less complex than they appear on the surface to be. In the main, the legal basis of urban organization is the Municipal Corporations Consolidation Act of 1882, which comprises a codification of the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 and a mass of subsequent and amending legislation. ”