There are 88

counties A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its so ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

. Nine of them existed at the time of the Ohio Constitutional Convention in 1802.. Other editions available at an
Google Books
/ref> A tenth county, Wayne, was established on August 15, 1796, and encompassed roughly the present state of

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

. Other editions available at During the Convention, the county was opposed to statehood, and was not only left out of the Convention, but dissolved; the current Wayne County is in northeastern Ohio, considerably distant from the area that was the original Wayne County. The

Ohio Constitution The Constitution of the State of Ohio is the basic governing document of the State of Ohio, which in 1803 became the 17th state to join the United States of America. Ohio has had three constitutions since statehood was granted. Ohio was created ...

allows counties to set up a

charter A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the ...

government as many

cities A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

and

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

s do, (OH county charter). Other editions available: an
Google Books
/ref> but only

Summit A summit is a point on a surface that is higher in elevation than all points immediately adjacent to it. The topographic terms acme, apex, peak (mountain peak), and zenith are synonymous. The term (mountain top) is generally used only for ...

and Cuyahoga counties have done so, the latter having been approved by voters in November 2009. Counties do not possess

home rule Home rule is the government of a colony, dependent country, or region by its own citizens. It is thus the power of a part (administrative division) of a state or an external dependent country to exercise such of the state's powers of governan ...

powers and can do only what has been expressly authorized by the

Ohio General Assembly The Ohio General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Ohio. It consists of the 99-member Ohio House of Representatives and the 33-member Ohio Senate. Both houses of the General Assembly meet at the Ohio Statehouse in Colu ...

. The elected county officials in

Ohio county government Ohio county government is the structure of official managerial and legal bodies of the List of Ohio counties, counties of Ohio, USA. It is marked by a loose organization and a diffusion of power, the basic framework not having been changed sin ...

s include three commissioners, a

sheriff A sheriff is a government official, with varying duties, existing in some countries with historical ties to England where the office originated. There is an analogous, although independently developed, office in Iceland, the , which is common ...

(the highest law enforcement officer in the county); prosecutor (equivalent of a

district attorney In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, county prosecutor, state attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or solicitor is the chief prosecutor or chief law enforcement officer represen ...

in other states);

coroner A coroner is a government or judicial official who is empowered to conduct or order an inquest into the manner or cause of death. The official may also investigate or confirm the identity of an unknown person who has been found dead within th ...

, engineer, Recorder,

auditor An auditor is a person or a firm appointed by a company to execute an audit.Practical Auditing, Kul Narsingh Shrestha, 2012, Nabin Prakashan, Nepal To act as an auditor, a person should be certified by the regulatory authority of accounting an ...

treasurer A treasurer is a person responsible for the financial operations of a government, business, or other organization. Government The treasury of a country is the department responsible for the country's economy, finance and revenue. The treasure ...

, and

clerk of courts A court clerk (British English: clerk to the court or clerk of the court ; American English: clerk of the court or clerk of court ) is an officer of the court whose responsibilities include maintaining records of a court and administering oaths t ...

. Population figures are based on the 2024 vintage

Census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

population estimates. The population of Ohio was 11,883,304 at that time, an increase of 0.7% from 2020. The average population of Ohio's counties was 135,038; Franklin County was the most populous (1,356,303) and Vinton County was the least (12,545). The average land area is . The largest county by area is

Ashtabula County Ashtabula County ( ) is the northeasternmost county in the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 census, the population was 97,574. The county seat is Jefferson, while its largest city is Ashtabula. The county was created in 1808 and later organ ...

at , and its neighbor, Lake County, is the smallest at . The total area of the state is .

List of counties

List of county codes

The

Federal Information Processing Standard The Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) of the United States are a set of publicly announced standards that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has developed for use in computer systems of non-military United Stat ...

(FIPS) is used by the U.S. government to uniquely identify counties. In the following table, these codes link to the United States Census Bureau's "quick facts" for each county. Ohio's FIPS code of 39 is used to distinguish from counties in other states. For example, Adams County's unique nationwide identifier is 39001. Various state agencies identify counties by different coding schemes. The

Ohio Department of Taxation The Ohio Department of Taxation is the administrative department of the Ohio state government Ohio Rev. Code § 121.01 ''et seq.'' responsible for collection and administration of most state taxes, several local taxes and the oversight of real ...

assigns

consecutive numbers In mathematics, an integer sequence is a sequence (i.e., an ordered list) of integers. An integer sequence may be specified ''explicitly'' by giving a formula for its ''n''th term, or ''implicitly'' by giving a relationship between its terms. For ...

for the purpose of enumerating taxing districts. The

Ohio Department of Public Safety The Ohio Department of Public Safety (ODPS) is the administrative department of the government of Ohio, Ohio state government responsible for the protection and safety of residents and visitors. The Department of Public Safety's headquarters is l ...

, including the

Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles The Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles (abbreviated BMV) is an agency of the Ohio Department of Public Safety that registers motor vehicles and issues license plates and driver's licenses in the U.S. state of Ohio. It is headquartered in the state capi ...

, associates these county numbers with vehicle registrations. The Department of Transportation uses three-letter abbreviations in road inventory and traffic management applications. For historic preservation purposes,

Ohio History Connection Ohio History Connection, formerly The Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society and Ohio Historical Society, is a nonprofit organization incorporated in 1885. Headquartered at the Ohio History Center in Columbus, Ohio, Ohio History Connect ...

refers to counties by two- and three-letter abbreviations in the Ohio Archaeological Inventory and Ohio Historic Inventory, respectively.

List of counties

List of county codes

See also

References

Further reading