Local government is constitutionally mandated to provide basic services to communities within a three-sphere decentralised system of governance. Schedules 4B and 5B of the Constitution of South Africa (Act No. 106 of 1996) assign an array of expenditure responsibilities to the country’s 283 municipalities.97 The most essential of these is the provision of water, sanitation and electricity servi...

To assess the impact of electoral systems on voting turnout, cross-national studies can be usefully complemented by studies of turnout in local elections in countries using more than one electoral system at that level. In this article, we look at data from a 1998 survey of Swiss municipalities to revisit the findings of our earlier study. This previous study, based on a 1988 survey, concluded, ...

Waste treatment facilities are often shared among different municipalities as a means of managing wastes more efficiently. Usually, management costs are assigned to each municipality depending on the size of the population or total amount of waste produced, regardless of important environmental aspects such as per capita waste generation or achievements in composting or recycling. This paper pr...

Objectives: To assess the impact of a community based bicycle helmet programme aimed at children aged 5–12 years (about 140 000) from poor and well off municipalities. Methods: A quasi-experimental design, including a control group, was used. Changes in the risk of bicycle related head injuries leading to hospitalisation were measured, using rates ratios. Results: Reductions in bicycle related ...

OBJECTIVES This study explored and measured the presence, content and growth of municipal no-smoking by-laws and examined factors related to differences in by-law breadth and comprehensiveness. METHODS By-laws from each jurisdiction across Ontario were collected and scored relative to their breadth and restrictiveness using the Asbridge-O'Grady Index. Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance was u...

This study analyzes homicide incidence per municipality (county) in Brazil in the year 2008. The authors estimate and compare homicide rates according to different methods, finding evidence that depending on the method employed, the results can differ significantly, especially for small municipalities. Bayesian spatial procedures were employed, allowing minimization of variation in the rate est...

The state of Hidalgo, in Mexico, has been looking for a model to classify 84 municipalities according to certain economic and social parameters. The model will permit the development of policies for improving the conditions of those municipalities that are lagging behind. A previous model was created using statistical methods, applying the factorial analysis. Also was created a fuzzy logic mode...

We use a minimum requirement approach to derive the number of jobs in proximity services per inhabitant in French rural municipalities. We first classify the municipalities according to their time distance in minutes by car to the municipality where the inhabitants go the most frequently to get services (called MFM). For each set corresponding to a range of time distance to MFM, we perform a qu...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the efficiency of the Family Health Strategy in actions related to hypertension. METHODS Evaluative, cross-sectional quantitative research based on secondary data of 66 small municipalities located in the state of Santa Catarina, Southern Brazil, with maximum potential coverage of 100% by the Family Health Strategy in 2007. Input indicators, products and results were eva...

OBJECTIVES A cross-sectional investigation was designed to assess the quality of local government plans for public health emergencies and to determine whether relevant regulations for emergency plans are in place. METHODS Sixty-six municipalities were selected randomly using stratified sampling, and a questionnaire investigation on emergency plans was conducted in these municipalities. RESU...