The Detroit City Council is the legislative body of Detroit, Michigan, United States. The City Council consists of nine members elected for a four-year term in a single election conducted on an at-large and non-partisan basis. According to the city charter, the candidate who receives the highest number of votes becomes president of the Council, and the member receiving the second highest number of votes becomes the president pro tempore.
The City Council was first constituted as the legislative body of the city in 1824, and was called the Common Council until July 1, 1974. Prior to 1918, the council was elected from city wards. However, starting in 1918, all city council members were elected at large, unusual for a city of Detroit's size. On November 4, 2009, city voters overwhelmingly approved a referendum to once again elect most of the council by districts beginning in 2013, while allowing for two at-large seats.
Read more about Detroit City Council: Vacancies and Special Elections, Current Members, Former Members
Famous quotes containing the words city and/or council:
“I am not aware that any man has ever built on the spot which I occupy. Deliver me from a city built on the site of a more ancient city, whose materials are ruins, whose gardens cemeteries. The soil is blanched and accursed there, and before that becomes necessary the earth itself will be destroyed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Daughter to that good Earl, once President
Of England’s Council and her Treasury,
Who lived in both, unstain’d with gold or fee,
And left them both, more in himself content.
Till the sad breaking of that Parliament
Broke him, as that dishonest victory
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