Colima Colima, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Colima, is among the 31 states that make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It shares its name with its capital and main city, Colima. Colima is a small state of western Mexico on the cen ...

is a

state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

in West

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

that is divided into ten

municipalities A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

. According to the 2020 Mexican census, it has the smallest population of all Mexico's states with inhabitants, and is the fifth smallest by land area spanning . Municipalities in Colima are administratively autonomous of the state according to the 115th article of the

1917 Constitution of Mexico The current Constitution of Mexico, formally the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States (), was drafted in Santiago de Querétaro, in the State of Querétaro, Mexico, by a constituent convention during the Mexican Revolution. I ...

. The legal framework for Colima's municipalities is provided by Title VII of the state Constitution and the 2001 Law of Free Municipalities in the State of Colima. Every three years, citizens elect a

municipal president A ''presidente municipal'' ( English: "municipal president") is the chief of government of municipios in Mexico. This title was also used in the Philippines during the Spanish and American colonial periods; it is comparable to a mayor of the tow ...

(Spanish: ''presidente municipal'') by a

plurality voting Plurality voting refers to electoral systems in which the candidates in an electoral district who poll more than any other (that is, receive a plurality) are elected. Under single-winner plurality voting, and in systems based on single-member ...

system who heads a concurrently elected municipal council (''ayuntamiento'') responsible for providing all the public services for their constituents. The municipal council consists of a variable number of trustees and councillors (''regidores y síndicos''). Municipalities are responsible for public services (such as water and sewerage), street lighting, public safety, traffic, and the maintenance of public parks, gardens and cemeteries. They may also assist the state and federal governments in education, emergency fire and medical services, environmental protection and maintenance of monuments and historical landmarks. Since 1984, they have had the power to collect

property tax A property tax (whose rate is expressed as a percentage or per mille, also called ''millage'') is an ad valorem tax on the value of a property.In the OECD classification scheme, tax on property includes "taxes on immovable property or Wealth t ...

es and

user fee A user fee is a fee, tax, or impost payment paid to a facility owner or operator by a facility user as a necessary condition for using the facility. People pay user fees for the use of many public services and facilities. At the federal level ...

s, although more funds are obtained from the state and federal governments than from their own income. Article 88 of the state Constitution and Articles 11, 60 and 61 of the state's Law of Free Municipalities provide for the establishment of auxiliary authorities (''autoridades auxiliares'') to represent communities in the municipalities other than the municipal seat (''cabecera''). These are elected by residents of the communities every three years, and are unipersonal except in rural communities with a population over 2,000 inhabitants, which elect boards (''juntas'') comprising a president, secretary and treasurer. Auxiliary authorities serve as liaisons between local communities and the municipal government. They do not have executive powers and do not constitute an independent level of local government. The largest municipality by population in Colima is Manzanillo, with 191,031 residents, and the smallest municipality is Ixtlahuacán with 5,623 residents. The largest municipality by area is also Manzanillo which spans , while

Villa de Álvarez Ciudad de Villa de Álvarez is a city in the Mexican state of Colima. It is the municipal seat of Villa de Álvarez municipality. The city is adjacent to the northwest side of the state capital city of Colima and the two can be considered as " ...

is the smallest at . The first municipality to incorporate was

on and the newest municipality is Armería which incorporated .

Municipalities

File:Beach_West_of_Karmina_Palace_-_panoramio.jpg, alt=Manzanillo Bay, Manzanillo, Colima's largest municipality by population File:Basílica Menor de Colima.jpg, alt=Basílica Menor de Colima,

, capital and second largest municipality by population File:Villa d Alvarez.JPG, alt=Downtown Villa de Álvarez,

, third largest municipality by population.

References

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