The comarcal council (Catalan: consell comarcal, Galician: consello comarcal, Aragonese: concello comarcal, Spanish: consejo comarcal), also somewhat misleadingly referred to as county council, is a local administration and government body in the comarcas of some parts of Spain, mostly in the autonomous communities of Catalonia, Aragon and the Basque Country.
The comarcal council is normally constituted by representatives of the municipalities within the comarcal demarcation, who are elected according to law-regulated mechanisms.
Council membership of a comarca is allocated according to its population using the following table:
Only in the province of ÃÂlava comarcas have administrative status, known as kuadrilla in Basque and cuadrilla in Spanish. There are Añana, Ayala/Aiara, Gorbeialdea, Plain of Alava, Riojan Alava, Alava Mountains and Vitoria. Their comarcal councils bear the name kuadrillako batzarra in Basque or junta de cuadrilla in Spanish (county assembly in English).
Out of all 7 Alavan cuadrillas, only the Vitoria cuadrilla does not have any cuadrilla institutions, thus only keeping the name symbolically for the natural comarca, since all governance is assumed by the city council of the municipality of Vitoria-Gasteiz, the only municipality that makes up that cuadrilla.
In Catalonia, the councilors of each of the comarcal councils are elected indirectly every four years from the results of the municipal elections of each of the municipalities that make up the comarca. They are elected under a mixed system of party-list proportional representation using the D'Hondt method, where both the number of votes obtained for each candidacy and the number of city councilors are taken into account.
Formally created in 1987, there are currently 41 comarcal councils in Catalonia. They establish the lowest system of government after the city council itself, with its organization comprising a collegial body, the plenary session, and a unipersonal body, the President. The plenary session is composed of councilors from each of the city councils of the municipalities that make up the comarca.
The plenary session chooses the President. They also have a manager fully integrated into the administration, akin to a city manager, who is fully dedicated to executing the tasks of the regional government and administration.
The Barcelonès comarcal council was formally abolished in 2019, rendering it the only comarca without one. Currently, due to its recent inception, it is only scheduled for the Lluçanès comarca to form its first comarcal council after the 2027 local elections.
Council membership of a comarca is allocated according to its population using the following table:
TBD