Talk:List of counties in California

Wikiproject help
Some helpful information on U.S. county lists can be found at WP:COUNTYLISTS. Tom pw (talk) (review) 16:22, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Upgraded maps
I was looking at county maps, like File:Alameda County.png and File:LA County Incorporated Areas.svg. These don't seem to be as useful as the actual census maps, which show the names for the incorporated places. It would be nice to either post the Census maps, or nicer ones which do show place names. -- Beland 23:01, 14 July 2007 (UTC) Calaveras County is named from the Spanish word for "Skull".70.171.235.149 03:33, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Napa County is named for the indigenous Wappo Indian word "Nah-Pah", for "Home".70.171.235.149 03:36, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Not sure what county name etymologies have to do with upgrading maps.

I have been wondering tho how county maps can be updated. I'm most aware of Sacramento County (tho I assume some otheres are outdated/inacurate aswell), and the county map that outlines incorporated and unincorporated areas is out of date as some areas are not the same as on the map. I don't know how to do stuff with images nor do I know where the images came from or how they were made so I can't update them myself. So if anyone knows more about the county area images. . . — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.202.113.188 (talk) 02:46, 13 September 2013 (UTC)


 * They likely came from the US Census Bureau TIGER data which contains maps of every state, county, city and CDP in the US, among others. Int21h (talk) 19:40, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Use This Map with Enlarged San Francisco
In the table of counties, you can't see the tiny red dot indicating San Francisco for the San Francisco entry.

Use this map from the San Francisco article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_county_map_(San_Francisco_County_enlarged).svg

The fact that I cannot find this image to edit in the counties article is an object lesson on hideously overly-complex Wikipedia markup. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.205.210.143 (talk) 03:51, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorting?
I tried to sort the counties according to population size, the result was everything but sorted. Is it just me or is the Javascript buggy? I'm using Firefox 3.6. --84.153.64.207 (talk) 02:13, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay, the population row is sorted with the Nts template which doesn't like commas and high numbers. --84.153.64.207 (talk) 02:50, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Sections which should be deleted IMO
There are three sections which seem to have no reason to be here: "Failed attempts to organize counties," "County secession proposals", and "City-county-borough proposals". All have been tagged as needing verification for more than a year; all remain unverified. None of these supposed proposals seems to have any serious basis in reality or historical significance. I propose to delete all three sections, pending some time for discussion here. --MelanieN (talk) 23:58, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
 * WP:BOLD. --Kurykh (talk) 00:10, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I'll be bold - but in a week or so. Give people a chance to chime in first. I take it you don't object to the deletion. --MelanieN (talk) 00:42, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, that's long enough. They're outta here. --MelanieN (talk) 20:51, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

What does this mean?
I have no idea what this paragraph means, or how the cities named are supposed to illustrate the point:"The idea of 'opting out' of county control in California has been taken to its logical extremes. Almost all of the city of Vernon is one large industrial zone, while almost all of the town of Los Altos Hills is zoned as residential."

Does this make sense to somebody, and can it be better expressed? Or should it just be removed? --MelanieN (talk) 17:37, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
 * It's been five months since I asked this and nobody has answered. I am going to remove it. --MelanieN (talk) 01:30, 26 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I was not watching this page for such information. This question keeps coming up again and again, and I do not think the information should be removed until it is answered: what is the solution for a conflict of laws between a county and a city? This has application to the statement at hand, concerning conflict of zoning regulations. Int21h (talk) 05:08, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Is that the point that this was supposed to illustrate? Can it be rephrased to make it clear that this is the issue it refers to? --MelanieN (talk) 16:58, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't know what it was supposed to illustrate, but it obviously relates to conflict of laws between county and city, albeit in the con>text of zoning in this case.
 * The argument is obviously unclear and imperfect, though, but without actually knowing what the actual law is, it would be difficult for anyone to make a reasoned argument. I'm just saying: just because the statements are confusing does not mean they should be removed, but refined if possible. It all comes down to philosophy; I am of the opinion that we should salvage statements made by (obviously) novice editors if at all possible. I think all this statement needs is clarification on the state of the law.
 * I mean, zoning violations are crimes (by default), so we should all know the state of the law, right? I mean, if you don't know California law, you surely cannot wittingly agree to Wikipedia's terms of service, which is a contract with a California choice of law provision as I understand. "Ignorance is no excuse" and all that nonsense. Int21h (talk) 18:12, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I just didn't (and to some extent don't) understand what any of that has to do with the passage I deleted. The city of Vernon is all industrial, the city of Los Altos Hills is all residential, so what? No crime is involved, no unclear or conflicting laws suggested. If you can find a way to make this into a coherent point, then by all means go ahead and add it into the California local government article. --MelanieN (talk) 19:03, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * My point is that I think the editor was trying to make a point about, or at least was on the subject of, zoning ordinance relationships between counties and cities. They failed, but I think the issue/subject is genuine. Int21h (talk) 20:24, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Still trying to understand: Does this get at what you think the item is about? "Sometimes the main reason for incorporating a city is so that the local residents can make their own laws regarding zoning, etc., instead of being subject to county control. For example, the city of South San Francisco, California incorporated in 1908 because in 1907 the county had refused to allow construction of a smelter supported by the townspeople."

--MelanieN (talk) 19:30, 27 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes. I tried and tried but I just was not able to find any information.. (Perhaps I was using the wrong keywords?) Now that I have a general idea of what the deal is (cities overrule counties on zoning at least) I can try and find the laws. This information you found is good. Thank you. Int21h (talk) 20:23, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * My off-the-cuff impression is that chartered or official cities overrule counties on zoning, but non-chartered or non-official settlements have to abide by county rules. Giving San Diego County as an example, I would think that the eighteen incorporated communities do their own zoning (and other city functions such as policing, unless they contract with the county to do them), but the unincorporated communities like Fallbrook are under county rules. I know for a fact, because I sit on local community planning boards, that the city of San Diego does its own zoning without any input from the county. --MelanieN (talk) 21:32, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Merge with Local government in California
This article is supposed to be a list. As of now, it duplicates and splits information with the Local government in California article. This information, sans the actual list, should be merged into that article (including information previously removed, because no one watches list articles for substantive information.) Int21h (talk) 05:01, 27 August 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree that the lead section is inappropriate here and should be mostly moved to "Local government in California". It really doesn't belong in this article, which is excellent as a table-format list and needs only a brief introduction. However, IMO this does not need a formal "merge" request, since you are not proposing to delete this article or make it into a redirect; you are merely talking about taking some of the information out of this article and putting it into a more appropriate article. That does not require a formal WP:MERGE process, which is defined as a "procedure by which the contents of two or more pages are united within a single page". That's not what you are proposing and not something I would agree to. But I do agree that most of the prose introduction would be more appropriate in the "local government" article. I would suggest that you remove your "requested merge" tag, since that is not what you are asking for, and go ahead and insert this information where it should go (unless you want to wait a few days to see if anyone objects). --MelanieN (talk) 17:10, 27 August 2013 (UTC)


 * I have done it. Int21h (talk) 18:36, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Good. Glad we are in agreement. --MelanieN (talk) 18:52, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20140113173604/http://www.uscounties.org/cffiles_web/counties/state.cfm?statecode=ca& to http://www.uscounties.org/cffiles_web/counties/state.cfm?statecode=ca
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080605065216/http://www.naco.org/Template.cfm?Section=Find_a_County&Template=%2Fcffiles%2Fcounties%2Fstate.cfm&state.cfm&statecode=CA to http://www.naco.org/Template.cfm?Section=Find_a_County&Template=%2Fcffiles%2Fcounties%2Fstate.cfm&state.cfm&statecode=CA
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20100107152529/http://csac.counties.org/ to http://www.csac.counties.org/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110104034024/http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/maps/california_map.html to http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/maps/california_map.html

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FIPS codes
The FIPS code citation is a link to a non existing site at the epa. Looking up FIPS on wiki notes changes to the standard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIPS_county_code — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:206:8480:D970:2DF4:26DD:B8E2:8EFA (talk) 03:06, 17 March 2020 (UTC)