Kalawao County is one of the only counties (if not the only) that has no elected official governing it. Instead the Director of Health is the Mayor who is appointed by the Governor.
Besides us Connecticuters who have no county government whatsoever! They were abolished in the 60s and now county lines serve purely geographical purposes lol
@@treyhazard7318 Connecticut doesn't even have counties anymore. They have officially been replaced by planning regions for all purposes. Rhode Island and Massachusetts do still have counties with no governments.
@@treyhazard7318 Sure. Connecticut hasn't had county _governments_ since the 60s, but it still had counties until the end of last year, at least according to the US Census Bureau. As of 2024, the bureau no longer recognizes counties in Connecticut and instead recognizes the state's nine planning regions as county equivalents.
To be clear: Baltimore, St. Louis, and Carson City aren't just examples of independent cities. Those three plus the 38 in Virginia make up the complete list of independent cities in the US.
I used to assume that incorporated cities were always independent of counties, since I grew up in Virginia, and my city of birth happened to be one of the others on the short list (creating slightly unusual bureaucratic situations since they often ask for your county of birth).
@@MattMcIrvin I learned about this when I started trying to compare cities and counties across the country and kept getting just hitting a wall where nothing in Virginia made any sense. the "cities" are sometimes things that look like counties (looking at you, Virginia Beach) and the "counties" are sometimes things that look like cities (looking at you, Arlington) and i just have to try not to start pulling my hair out
St. Louis and Carson City are the only independent cities in the US that are located west of the Mississippi, but Carson City is the only independent city in the US west of the Great Divide.
Just to clarify the reason Arlington County isnt apart of the District anymore is for a couple reasons. 1 Alexandria and Arlington were in economic decline due to restrictive policies, and only allowing government buildings on the east side of the Potomac. Another reason is because of slavery. Alexandria was a very popular hub for trading slaves, and there was rumors that abolitionists wanted to end slavery in the district, leading to the people in Alexandria and Arlington wanting to be reincorporated back into slave friendly Virginia.
Also, Arlington County was Alexandria County and I'm sure that they were with Alexandria city and they were separated and the town of the county was changed
Broomfield county Colorado came into existence because the police department could never figure out which county they would have to take someone to in the case of a criminal issue. Greeley was an hour away and it became difficult to drive as the population grew in traffic increased. It could be a 90 minute drive if there was traffic. It just became easier to separate the geographic area of Broomfield into its own county. Very logical decision.
Kearny NJ is pronounced "CARny" The 8 counties of CT were abolished as governmental entities by a State law passed in the 1970's. The counties remain as only lines on a map. The only county official remaining is a Sheriff, and his/her only role is to serve subpoenas and other legal notices. Why this oddity could not have been eliminated and done by the State itself escapes me ... perhaps the legislation left an un-closed loophole. But overall, this simplifies a small state's government by eliminating the costs and bureaucracies of an entire layer. Why other similarly small states haven't also done this by now is ridiculous.
Rhode Island also abolished county governments, with the authority lying with 31 towns instead of 5 counties. Most of Massachusetts has abolished county governments.
Under Ohio Constitution, the sheriff does similarly BUT it isn't the highest ranking officer. The county coroner is as he can arrest the sheriff! Oddities in every state's laws. Cleveland, Ohio had a funny but logical one for wagon days. Cliff Note version is waving a red, lite, lantern, at the other three directions of an intersection and yelling something before proceeding.
We don’t have sheriffs either anymore! They were abolished in 2000 and replaced with “state marshals”. There’s also actually a growing movement of those who want to bring county government back. Yes, the state itself is physically small, but without counties, and with such strong towns, it’s proven difficult to get projects done that require the cooperation of multiple municipalities with their own individual governments
I live in Cedar County, Iowa. It is exactly 24 miles x 24 miles. The north-south roads are avenues in alphabetical order. The term country mile comes from our rural toads being perfect squares 1 mile x 1 mile.
Suffolk County, MA only have 4 cities in there. Other than Boston, the three suburbs are Winthrop, Chelsea, and Revere. With a county that small, it's very urban as you can see and is one of the most urbanized counties in the US by far.
I live in NW PA and you can see the history of colonial settlement in our counties. Eastern Pa counties are smaller, random shaped (influenced by geography too), and seemingly arbitrary. As you go west into land that was settled later the counties get larger and blockier (several counties broke away from larger ones IE Beaver county from Allegheny County). You can see the major difference in NE Ohio, the first area to be settled from new territories other than the 13 Colonies AKA the Northwest Purchase/Connecticut Reserve. Counties were created using a system revolving around the center courthouse, and they look much more uniform
Ik. My grandma lives in Lake County, OH, and the county geography of NE OH and NW PA always fascinated me compared to my SoCal-based viewpoint on County shapes
Norfolk County in Massachusetts includes the towns of Brookline and Cohasset which are geographically separated from the rest of the county. Doesn't matter much since in Mass the county governments basically run the court system and not much else.
Yes, in most of New England, counties are vestigial divisions of government, since towns and cities cover the entire land area and perform most of the functions that county government would elsewhere. The court, jail and prison systems are usually organized by county.
@@MattMcIrvin In Mass, usually. In Vermont most of what counties would do in larger states is done at the state level. There are county sheriffs' departments, and they tend to do a lot of contract work - construction zone patrols and the like.
@@MattMcIrvinMaine, NH and Vermont provide more services at the county level since the towns are much more sparsely populated and thus can’t provide all their own services
As noted, Chelsea, MA is in Suffolk County, along with Boston, Winthrop and Revere. Cambridge and the northwest are Middlesex; all to the north is Essex. To the south are Norfolk and Plymouth counties.
Hudson County NJ was part of Bergen County, one of New Jersey's Original Counties. All of present day Hudson County broke away from Bergen County in 1840 Bergen expanded. The most southern part of today's Bergen County originally joined Hudson County (East Rutherford, Rutherford, Lyndhurst & North Arlington) but rejoined Bergen County.
Great job beave. Im also fansinated by this topic, and daily, I find myself going through county maps of places that are over 1000 miles away from where I am.
Love a county deep dive, you’re so right at the start about how they’re kind of untapped and fascinating. As a lifelong Virginia resident, the whole city/county thing was one of the head scratchers that got me all into geography to begin with. Love the video
I'm not sure if someone added this earlier but Suffolk County Massachusetts is actually Boston, Revere, Winthrop, and Chelsea. Chelsea is a tiny city of just 2.22 sq mi of land.
One you don't mention, but which is significant is Rockwall County in Texas. At 149 sq. miles, it's not small compared to the ones you list, but for TEXAS it's tiny (everything is bigger in Texas, even small stuff). It's also one of the richest counties in Texas.
Even the quarantine one in Hawaii is bigger than the City of London, which is about one square mile but also has very weird governance. If you do go to the City of London, remember that there are Premier Inns and Travelodges which cannot be booked except directly.
@andycockrum1212 That's quite different than the biggest cities . Case in point Los Angeles County outside of Los Angeles City nearly 4 million people, is nearly an additional 6 million people. Cook County outside of Chicago's 2.7 million people is an additional 2.5 million.
Back in Jr High, in the late 70s, we had to take a California History class and one fo the things we learned was how the current counties evolved from the original counties. I always thought that was fascinating and can still recite the counties and their county seats. I can probably still draw a map of California with the counties.
The ironic thing about Virginia is that Arlington County is laid like a large city. Chesapeake City, located in the Norfolk, Virginia Beach, and Portsmouth area is legally an independent city but looks like a rural county, including farms. Go figure.
Fun fact about the independent cities of Virginia: the smallest is Falls Church, which currently is only 2.2 square miles, and resides near Arlington County. I believe this also makes it the smallest independent city in the country. If you would like more info about Falls Church, just ask me.
I'd be interested to see more about the independent cities. I've read up on the history of Saint Louis, and my understanding is that the city became separate from the county because they were paying county taxes but receiving minimal services from the county, while at the same time paying city taxes to receive services from the city that were being provided by the county elsewhere. So if you think this is a city sized tax dodge, you're right!
10:09 notably, Ellis and Liberty Islands are shared by New York and New Jersey, because the treaty they signed establishing their border at the Hudson River gave the original islands to New York, but when NYC dredged up more land NJ staked a claim to the new parts of the islands on NJ’s side of the Hudson.
In southern Ohio (Virginia/southern ancestry), we pronounce the City of W-o-o-s-t-e-r as Wooster, like rooster. Whereas northern Ohio (New England) pronounces is Wuster. I still slip & entertain my friends with my "hillbilly" pronunciation or occassional twang. Funny though, really can't be called "hillbilly" because our land (where I live) is flat(tish).
8:59 Nah, the REAL reason Washington DC didn’t maintain its diamond shape is due to slave trade along the Potomac River in present day Arlington & Alexandria. Look it up if you have doubts
How does this video not feature any counties in Puerto Rico? XD the County of Cataño is 7.04 sq mi. Beating easily the top 1 in this list (yes Puerto Rico has Municipios, but they are County equivalents, just like New York Burrows)
As an Irishman, I was always confused growing up how in American shows, a county would be like one major town when in my county (County Kerry) there is several major towns and it can take 2 or 3 hours to transverse end to end and there all different sections. I think US counties more fit our local town districts. Fun fact; a Count was called an Earl in Britain & Ireland so that’s why you hear “Earl and Countess” and they’ve ran the county in the past and the counties were broken into Baronies ran by barons. We still use baronies today for planning permission applications and house deeds
Yeah, but it’s not all like that here in America. It varies. Some of our counties are exactly how you described like for instance I live in Los Angeles county. Your head would spin with how densely populated it is and how many cities are inside of it, but then there are really tiny counties that only have one seat. There’s a huge variety here when it comes to counties
In the US it can be interesting to consider the city police vs the county sheriff departments and their quasi-independent jurisdictions. Sheriffs are elected in a popular vote by county residents whereas the city police chief is typically appointed by the mayor or some commission established by the city council.
In Texas you'll find large counties containing dozens of cities, and huge cities that sprawl across several counties. You'll also find a county larger than some European nations in which only 70 or so people live. Go figure.
Michigan has Holland in Allegan and Ottawa Counties, Milan in Washtenaw and Monroe, Northville in Wayne and Oakland, South Haven in Van Buren and Allegan. The big one is Lansing, the only state capital that does not also service as the county seat where the state capital lies. Also Lansing goes in parts of 3 counties in Michigan. I am sure Michigan has other examples, but these ones come to mind.
Next time you make videos about counties, consider the following: The youngest counties in the country (Broomfield County is the youngest.) Counties that either were proposed or had existed and then were gone. Why Louisiana calls their counties "parishes".
Texas created a couple of counties in the territory it lost in the Compromise of 1850: Santa Fe and Worth. Later it organized Greer County between two forks of the Red River, but the Supreme Court ruled that the south fork was the boundary between Texas and Oklahoma, and Greer County became part of the then-Oklahoma Territory. Then there were Foley and Buchel Counties in the Big Bend region which were absorbed by Brewster County because of sparse population, and likewise Encinal County in South Texas was annexed to Webb County (Laredo and a lot of ranchland).
I'm a Long Islander who used to live in Queens, and I had no idea Manhattan was the second smallest county in America. I'm just glad it's easily accessible and not isolated from the rest of the state.
For any Aussies here, from my take on counties in the US, it would be safe to say they the equivalent of LGA’s (Local government area’s) here in AUS? Seems to be my take, tho LGA’s can be anything from Shire’s, City’s, council’s etc Tho US counties seem to have more power at the local level than LGA’s with some exceptions like the Canberra where there is no council’s.So state and local services and funding are done at the same level.
Great video! Very interesting, however we don't have counties, per se, in Louisiana. We have parishes. We're the only state in the union that does, as Louisiana follows Civil Law not Common Law like the rest of the country. It's a carryover from Louisiana being governed by Catholic countries like Spain and France.
Condolidated city-county pops up in Indiana with Indianapolis and Marion County. Teo cities in Kentucky, Louisville (pronounce loovull) and Lecington are recent mergers. We try them in Ohio, but some outlying suburbs and big cities go "oh hell no." City of Dayton bought and annexed property in neighboring county as a hedge of getting landlocked as there was a serious effort to create a consolidated city/county government. I think the plan was patterned after Indianapolis and its Marion County merger?
As always, great video man! Couple points of clarification. To my understanding, Arlington would have continued staying in DC if the federal government had its way, but the rich white slave-owning majority in Arlington at the time wanted to stay in VA due to wanting to preserve slavery within its borders, and the county pressured and successfully voted to join VA instead. Which is, you know, not great. Also, as somebody else noted, Kearny is pronounced “Carney” like a circus. There’s also a town in south Jersey called Carney’s point, so you’d think Kearny would be pronounced how it’s spelled but no. Hudson county rocks though, and as a former resident, Jersey City is phenomenal except for the traffic all the time 😭
I’m a native of Fairfax County, Virginia. My understanding is that Arlington and Alexandria wanted to be part of Virginia. Keep in mind this was during the civil war. The governor of Virginia ordered that they seed those places back to Virginia. That’s why DC looks so lob sided.
Alaska, where I live, doesn't have counties: we have boroughs as our next subdivision of government under the state...except for the Unorganized Borough, which isn't itself a borough. It's all the land that's not part of one of the 19 organized boroughs, which also makes it non-contiguous. The Unorganized Borough has a population of roughly 77,000 people -- about 10% of the state's population. However, it also encompasses around 50% of the state's land area: if it were its own state, it would still be the largest in the country, larger than Texas (lol Texas) or California. Communities and cities within this area are self-governing, with no county-equivalent government between it and the state. Which is also pretty unique. If anyone's gonna be in Valdez (one of the largest cities in the Unorganized Borough) April 20th, my band Hot Dish is playing Valdez Brewery! It was worth a shot :-)
Washington D.C didn’t give up the Virginia side due to a lack of development, it was given up due to the interests of slavery in Virginia and specifically Alexandria (formerly part of DC) which was a major hub for the slave trade.
How about how new counties were created in turn of splitting from their former counties from becoming consolidated into a city county like Queens To Nassau.
Not all states are subdivided into counties. Alaska does have county equivalents (Boroughs) but they only get implemented if locations decide to organize one. The bulk of the state is unorganized.
The 5 counties of city of New York do not exist because the city is so large. New York, Kings, Queens & Richmond Counties all existed since 1683. The Bronx was originally part of Westchester County which also created in 1683. Upon annexation, Bronx County was created. These counties all existed before being annexed into the city of New York. When only the western portion of Queens County joined NYC, the Nassau County was created for the unannexed towns.
I can tell you're not from Massachusetts by your pronunciations. The L in Norfolk and Suffolk is silent. Also, Nantucket is a town, not a city. Counties matter little in Massachusetts anyway. Half of them no longer exist as governing entities though certain regional officials are still elected on that basis per the state constitution. The entire state is covered by incorporated cities and towns which is where people say they live. Nobody from MA is likely to tell you they live in X County.
I suggest you look into the history of Arlington and Alexandria, because that is NOT at all how the history went down. 😅 They retrogressed because of slavery in 1846.
As an adjunct discussion to this, are federal or state monies apportioned to counties in some ways which favor tiny or large ones? If I'm a huge county with a tiny population or any combination does this min/max benefits in any way?
Nantucket is not a consolidated city-county, because Nantucket is not a city. It is an incorporated town. This makes it the only consolidated _town-county_ in the country.
What you said about Arlington is incorrect. The citizens of Virginia wanted it back because they were upset at the federal governance and so congress retroceeded it back
I happen to live in one of the smallest counties in Utah- in terms of square miles- approximately the same size as the smallest state. It's nothing really, it's just always stricken me as curious.
@@JayYoung-ro3vuThe history of some of these cities are interesting. Especially in the Hampton Roads area where cities went on an annex spree in the mid 20th century.
@smashing_data4292 As discussed most cities. Growing & shifting population centers that were outside of the cities. We saw, locally, that occurring in mid 1990s on. Our state capital city would routinely annex 200-300 acres per request. The juggernaut has slowed as infill construction downtown and developers filling in areas at city's edge from properties annexed back then. My research shows that many counties recognized that a growing county seat city was vital. Thus, they allowed such annexations or mergers. States allowed easier annexation before cities abused it by creating "hammers" (leapfrogging unannexed properties to get to the in-process property(ies) or creating "islands. You still see such examples in cities of any size.
@@JayYoung-ro3vuThat's interesting. I just know that Richmond acquired a huge chuck of Chesterfield County back in the day and that Manchester used to be a city. I miss living in Richmond during my college days.
Then we have the counties with the smallest populations. An example: Commiefornia has Alpine County, population 1,200. The smallest is Texas' Loving County, population roughly 55.
Yeah, it's crazy that Loving County, despite virtually no-one living there and being relatively small in area compared to neighboring counties, is still large enough in area to keep off this list.
After all the massive reorganizations of British local goverment in the last 60 years, attempting to compare British to US government is an excercise in futility. I lived in Britain for the first 10 years of my life, and I now find that my old town is no longer in the same county as when I lived there! And the new county it ended up in no longer has an actual county government (thanks Margaret Thatcher!)
You said Kearny wrong, supposed to be “carn-y”. And you kind of misrepresented the history of the county it’s in. Pretty sloppy video overall, and the way you opened made you sound like you think you’re entitled to consistent subscriber growth. I like your stuff but take your time with it.
Originally counties in New York State were much bigger and as areas of the counties became more populated, they would break away and form new counties - although in the case of the Bronx, it was taken over by New York City (eventually the burrows were also made into counties).
