Government
Local government for the City of Joplin is provided through a nine member City Council, whose members are elected by voters citywide, with four seats being assigned to designated geographic zones of the city. The City Council members include the city's Mayor who is responsible for serving as meeting chair and official spokesman for the City Council, and the Mayor Pro Tem who is responsible for performing the Mayor's duties in the latter's absence, both of whom are elected every two years by their fellow council members.
Following the April, 2012 city elections, the City Council members included:
- Melodee Colbert-Kean (Mayor)
- Bill Scearce (Mayor Pro Tem)
- Mike Woolston
- Morris Glaze
- Jack Golden
- Trish Rainey
- Gary Shaw
- Benjamin Rosenberg
- Michael Seibert
Law enforcement services are provided by the Joplin Police Department. On the state-level, the city is represented in the Missouri House of Representatives by Republican Bill White of the 129th District, although a small portion of the city lies within the 128th District represented by Republican Charlie Davis, and in the Missouri Senate by Republican Ron Richard. The city also lies within Missouri's 7th congressional district.
Read more about this topic: Joplin, Missouri
Famous quotes containing the word government:
“To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
“The government will ... go on in the highly democratic method of conscripting American manhood for European slaughter.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“Plato says that the punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is, to live under the government of worse men; and the like regret is suggested to all the auditors, as the penalty of abstaining to speak,—that they shall hear worse orators than themselves.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)