Administrative divisions of New York (state)
The administrative divisions of New York are the various units of government that provide local services in the American state of New York. The state is divided into boroughs, counties, cities, towns, and villages. They are municipal corporations, chartered (created) by the New York State Legislature, as under the New York State Constitution the only body that can create governmental units is the state. All of them have their own governments, sometimes with no paid employees, that provide local services. Centers of population that are not incorporated and have no government or local services are designated hamlets. Whether a municipality is defined as a borough, city, town, or village is determined not by population or land area, but rather on the form of government selected by the residents and approved by the New York State Legislature. Each type of local government is granted specific home rule powers by the New York State Constitution. There are still occasional changes as a village becomes a city, or a village dissolves, each of which requires legislative action. New York also has various corporate entities that provide local services and have their own administrative structures (governments), such as school and fire districts. These are not found in all counties.
Separate municipal buildings for (at that time) the town and village of Monroe in Orange County
Albany City Hall, the seat of local government in New York's capital city
Sign for the Hamlet of Sand Lake within the Town of Sand Lake, New York
Boroughs of New York City
The Boroughs of New York City are the five major governmental districts that compose New York City. The boroughs are the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. Each borough is coextensive with a respective county of the State of New York: The Bronx is Bronx County, Brooklyn is Kings County, Manhattan is New York County, Queens is Queens County, and Staten Island is Richmond County.
The current five boroughs of Greater New York as they appeared in 1814. The Bronx was part of Westchester County, Queens County included modern Nassau County, Kings County had six towns, one of which was Brooklyn, and New York City is shown by hatching in lower Manhattan.
Chinatown in Manhattan, the most densely populated borough of New York City, with a higher density than any individual American city
Landmark nineteenth-century brownstones in the Greenpoint Historic District of Brooklyn, New York City's most populous borough
The Unisphere in Queens, the most ethnically diverse urban area in the world