On Tue, May 12, 2020 at 8:59 AM stevea <stevea...@softworkers.com> wrote:
> > We in the Massachusetts local community want to have admin_level 6 > > relations for these boundaries, and I personally consider deleting them > > to be vandalism. > > Then let's hear from them and their rather precisely-described to-become > arguments, rather than you and your beliefs (nor me and my repetitions of > these). Saying that a dozen of you believe 2 + 2 = 5 (especially as 11 other > voices aren't present) doesn't make it so. Cogent, scholarly, well-presented > arguments that address the salient political and legal topics described (in > the wiki page, where this more properly belongs, though I'm glad it's getting > a hopefully final gasp of exposure here) might be able to describe why 2 + 2 > might look like 5, in a certain way, in Connecticut, because of x, y and z. > But nobody is hearing that and nobody but user:Mashin is saying so. (At > least in wiki and talk-us. Slack? That's proprietary. I avoid secret-sauce > walkie-talkies in an open data project, but that's me. I do hear that people > use it to communicate, I wouldn't know what's on it). I'm surprised at this message. My one line summary of this reply: 'Asked and answered.' You've heard in some detail from at least me - in the last few days - regarding counties in Massachusetts and boroughs in New York. (I'm not speaking to Connecticut or Rhode Island, since I don't understand their political systems as well.) For both the Massachusetts and New York cases, while the (non-)counties have ceded most legislative and executive function to a higher body, they do retain some effective local government. In New York City, the county courts still exist - the Great Consolidation had no effect on the judicial branch. The county courts in New York City are paid by the state, but that's true of all the other counties as well. In Massachusetts, counties that have been 'dissolved' continue to elect their own sheriffs and DA's - who are paid by the state, but whose jurisdiction extends to the county, as well as retaining their county courts (also paid by the state). Therefore, for the Massachusetts situation, you're saying 'lets hear the arguments' for arguments that you have not answered in public with more than an enigmatic, 'and so it goes.' Or to some extent, you're adding a new set of requirements, a specific quantum of 'home rule' - just how much, I don't grasp - that is required for `boundary=administrative`. Should `boundary=administrative` not exist at all in states whose constitutions have not been amended since 1907 to address _Hunter v City of Pittsburgh_? They may have functioning counties and cities, but municipal powers can be overruled by the higher legislature with the stroke of a pen. It would be rather an extreme position, although I suppose a consistent one, to say that if the constitution of the higher body doesn't guarantee home rule to the lower, that the lower doesn't exist; but that would have the effect of erasing county lines in all but a handful of the states. Does the subordinate body need to support all three branches of government? Does having its own judiciary, or its own elected justice department under the executive, suffice? Or must it have the power to legislate? Its own executive? What powers must the subordinate body enjoy? - Structural - Does the subordinate body have the ability to choose its form of government (within constitutional bounds), adopt and amend a charter? - Functional - Does the subordinate body have power to exercise local self-government - and is that power plenary, or limited to enumerated matters? - Fiscal - Does the subordinate unit have the power to determine its revenue sources, tax, spend, and borrow? - Personnel - Does the subordinate unit determine the employment rules and compensation of its employees? May it enter into collective bargaining agreements? Is it relevant whether a local government actually exercises all the discretionary authority with which it is endowed? (I bring to mind the extreme case of Sherrill, New York - which functions as a Village, with most services provided by the Town, but is actually a City, with a city charter, and could vote at any time to constitute a city government like any other.) You've gone beyond the (already controversial) point that 'a boundary=administrative requires home rule' into a very fine-grained debate over 'how much home rule is enough'. Moreover, you're introducing yet more complexity for data consumers. One key point for the administrative-level hierarchy is that it provides a fairly simple way to do a consistent rendering among different jurisdictions. A renderer can look at just the member ways of a boundary - which are themselves tagged boundary=administrative with the coarsest relevant admin_level. Unless it wishes to do something like shade the regions, it may remain entirely ignorant of the relations. This structure gives the benefit that a state line can be drawn only once and will not be overlain with county, town, ... lines that of course coincide with it; it will also not be drawn twice in opposite directions because it participates in the boundary relations of two states. A different type of relation 'boundary=region' or whatever does not fit into that scheme. Unifying the two to restore the 'state line' and 'county line' rendering styles will require geometric calculation that will be both expensive and brittle. Resolving coincident geometries has proven to be a technical nightmare; it's a big part of the problem, as well, with rendering road route relations. Note here that I'm not 'tagging for the renderer' in the sense of 'supplying incorrect data to get a pleasing rendering on the main map'; I'm speaking of 'adopting and maintaining a tagging convention needed for any conceivable renderer to adopt a similar style.' For example, if you look at https://kbk.is-a-geek.net/catskills/test4.html?la=42.0487&lo=-73.4886&z=13, you will see a rendering with heavy lines for the state boundary and lighter lines delineating counties. In that rendering, you will see Connecticut and Litchfield County to the southeast; Massachusetts and Berkshire County to the northeast, New York and the counties of Columbia and Dutchess to the west. I expect to see that on the map, because that's what I see on the highway signs. For the purposes for which I intend that map, the precise form of the local government is immaterial. The highway department considers the boundary to be significant enough to post a sign telling me that I'm crossing it. In fact, your argument is the great paradox of American municipal government. Counties and cities, for the most part, enjoy great political power, while having, under Dillon's Rule, very little legal legitimacy. This devolution of government to the local level is tolerated, even embraced, by the people, so the law, in its majesty, gazes upon it with a Nelsonian eye. Ubi non accusator, ibi non judex. Nevertheless, the settled law is that counties and municipalites are creatures of the State, and their governments are mere departments of the State government. Since the tension has been unresolved in the political sphere for a century and a half, it would be astonishing to expect OSM to resolve it by data modeling. I am satisfied with 'what it says on the sign.' That approach appalls the strict taxonomists. The strict taxonomists are welcome to model what they will, and commit the results to OSM, but, please, let's try not to break the "what it says on the sign" in our zeal to be formally correct. US political structures are messy and inconsistent. OSM is not going to tidy them. -- 73 de ke9tv/2, Kevin _______________________________________________ Tagging mailing list Tagging@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/tagging
