Cambridge, Massachusetts

Cambridge is a city in the Greater Boston area of Massachusetts, United States. It was named in honor of Cambridge, England, the town where its founding fathers had studied (at Cambridge University). Cambridge is most famous for the two prominent universities that call it home: Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 101,355, though even more people commute into Cambridge to work.

Law and government

Cambridge has a 9-member City Council, and a 6-member School Committee. The councillors and school committee members are elected every two years using the single transferable vote (STV) system. http://www.cambridgema.gov/~Election/prop-voting.html Since the disbanding of the New York City Community School Boards in 2002, the Council is unusual in being the only governing body in the United States to use STV http://ccrc.wustl.edu/~lorracks/projects/techreport/subsection3_4_4.html. Once a laborious process that took several days to complete, vote counting is now done by computer.

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The mayor is elected by the city councillors, from amongst themselves, and serves as the chair of City Council meetings. The mayor also sits on the School Committee. However, the Mayor is not the Chief Executive of the City. Rather, the City Manager, who is appointed by the City Council, serves in that capacity.

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