In 2004, there were 4.5 million municipal civil servants in the country: on the average, there were 2.5 servants for each 100 inhabitants. The bigger the population of municipalities, the more organized was their tax policy...

In 2004, there were 4.5 million municipal civil servants in the country: on the average, there were 2.5 servants for each 100 inhabitants. The bigger the population of municipalities, the more organized was their tax policy: all the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants had computerized systems to keep records of IPTU (Municipal Real Estate Tax ) and ISS (Service Tax). These are some of the data contained in the IBGE’s Survey of Basic Municipal Information – Public Administration (MUNIC), which, throughout 2004, distributed questionnaires among the administrators of the 5,560 Brazilian municipalities, collecting data about the number of servants, legislation, tax policies, transactions between municipalities, housing policies, city guard, child and teenage councils and matters related to the environment.

MUNIC investigated , for the first time, if the municipal governments had computer facilities and services aimed at the general public. It showed that, in 2004, all the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants (except Jaboatão dos Guararapes, in Pernambuco) had a web site. The survey also showed that among the 34 municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 32 had public-serving facilities. Among the services offered to the public, the most used was the telephone, followed by fax and e-mail.

In 2004, 950 of the 5,560 Brazilian municipalities had their own city guard. In 139 locations, the professionals used guns while working. In relation to the overall group of guards, it was observed that the participation of women reached almost 12% in the country.

Based on information provided by municipal governments, MUNIC 2004 also showed that over half (56%) of the municipalities in Brazil charged taxes of police power (related to security, hygiene, urban and social order, permission to the development of economic activities, etc.) In terms of housing, the proportion of municipalities in the Southeast region with specific organizations or family participating in housing programs was below the national average.

In 2004, there were 4.5 million municipal servants in the country

The Survey on Municipal Information (2004) also presents data about the servants of municipal executive power, collected from 5,560 Brazilian municipalities and representing specific features of each local government.

In 2004, city governments had 4,521,579 servants, which represented an increase of 11.1% in relation to the last survey, carried out in 2002. Over 452 thousand employees were added to the 2002 figure; part of this increase may be explained by the different methodology used in the last survey: it included employees from contracted companies in the group of civil servants. From 2002 to 2004, the South region presented the highest increase rate (14.8%) in terms of number of municipal servants; the highlight in the region was the state of Santa Catarina (26.8%). On the other hand, although the North region had the lowest level of increase (7.1%) in the number of servants, the state of Roraima (71%) presented the highest increase in two years, changing from 5,220 servants, in 2002, to 8,947, in 2004. In relation to 2002, the Southeast region had the biggest difference in terms of absolute numbers, with over 185,748 municipal servants. The state of São Paulo had increase of 11.4%, which represented over 82,097 servants in relation to the 2002 survey.

In 2004, the national average was 2.5 servants for each 100 inhabitants. However, in the Central West region, this average figure increased to 3.2 servants for each 100 inhabitants, the highest among all the Major Regions. The lowest rates were registered in the North and Southeast regions: 2.3 servants for each 100 inhabitants.

The survey also showed that the percentage of servants per group of 100 inhabitants is bigger in the municipalities with a smaller population. In the municipalities with up to 5 thousand inhabitants, where 2.5% of the Brazilian population live, there is a proportion of 5.2 servants for 100 inhabitants. In the ones with a population over 20,001 inhabitants, where almost 72% of the population live, the average number of servants is lower than 3 for 100 persons.

The 1988 Constitution regards the maintenance and organization of transportation services; of pre-school and primary school education; health, protection to the cultural-historic patrimony and the control over the use of the soil as municipal duties. These public services may be provided by either direct or indirect administration: legal entities such as auxiliary organizations for public administration, public companies, foundations or associations of mixed economy. In 2004, 1,032 city governments (among 5,560) declared to have some direct administration entity, accounting for an increase of 14.9% in relation to 2002.

Direct administration employees are the majority of municipal servants (94.7%). From 2002 to 2004, the number of public servants associated to direct administration increased by 11.0%, amounting to 4,281,921 persons working directly for the municipal executive division. In the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, the increase rate was 3.8%, extremely below the national average. The municipalities between 100,001 and 500 thousand inhabitants had average increase of 17.9% in the number of servants in direct administration.

Most municipal civil servants in direct administration are connected to city governments through the Unified Law System and the participation of this group (commonly known as statutory servants) in the total number of direct administration decreased from 66.1% in 2002, to 64.3% in 2004. Although there was fall in participation, over 199 thousand new servants have been contracted this way.

All the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants have computerized files of IPTU and ISS

The survey showed that municipalities with a big population have better administrative infrastructure, resulting in a higher tax collection. The Service Tax (ISS) and the Municipal Real Estate Tax (IPTU) are responsible for most (70%) of the tax collection of Brazilian municipalities.

In 2004, the Public Administration Survey informed that more municipalities have IPTU files (93.6%) than ISS ones (76.9%). The same is true about the use of computers in these files: 82% of Brazilian municipalities had computerized IPTU files and 61% had computerized ISS files. In the cities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, the use implementation of computerized systems is complete, for both ISS and IPTU.

In the Southeast (76.1%) and South regions (84.1%), where the economic activity is more intense, there were biggest proportions of use of computer in IPTU and ISS services. The states with the highest percentages were Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, both with 90%, followed by Santa Catarina (89%), Rio Grande do Sul (88%) and Espírito Santo (78%). The North and Northeast regions had, respectively, 36.2% and 33.7% of municipalities with computerized IPTU and ISS files.

Web sites: a common resource in bigger municipalities

For the first time, MUNIC investigated if city governments had computer and public-serving facilities. Three points were highlighted in the data analysis: the existence of a web page, the types of services available on it and the services offered to the general public.

In relation to Internet services, it was observed that in bigger municipalities, the presence of the service is more regular. Except in the municipality of Jaboatão dos Guararapes, in Pernambuco, all the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants had a web site. In the group with up to 5 thousand inhabitants, only 28% informed that they had Internet services: in those with a population ranging from 5,001 to 20 thousand inhabitants, there were 325; in the group of which the number of inhabitants ranged from 20,001 and 100 thousand, 53% had the service.

Considering the regions, the South is the only in which over half of the municipalities have a web site, especially Rio Grande do Sul (60%). In Santa Catarina and Paraná, a little more than 50% of the municipalities had a web site. The second region in this ranking was the Southeast (46%), where the highlights were Rio de Janeiro (72%) and São Paulo (63%). Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo had the lowest percentages (both close to 30%). In the Central West region, 33% of the municipalities had a web site. The state percentages were: 46% in Mato Grosso do Sul 36% in Mato Grosso and 27% in Goiás. The Federal District was not considered in the calculation because it has only one municipality. In the Northeast, the percentages were extremely varied: 46% in Rio Grande do Norte; 41% in Bahia; 40% in Sergipe; 37% in Ceará; 21% in Paraíba and in Alagoas; 20% in Pernambuco; 11% in Piauí and 7% in Maranhão. The North region presents the lowest percentages of web sites (16%). Rondônia is the state with the lowest percentage, with web site in about one third of its municipalities. In the other states, the percentages were about 20%, except in Tocantins where only 9% of the municipalities had the service.

Information services available in 28% of the web sites

The bigger the population of the municipality the bigger its chance of having services available on a web site. Information services were the most frequently found on web sites (search for localities, useful addresses, tourist and cultural information): they were present in 28% of the Brazilian municipalities. In the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 76% had information services, whereas in those places with up to 5 thousand inhabitants, the percentage was only 19%.

Present in 16% of Brazilian municipalities, the second most frequent type of service is that treated in the Official Diary of Public Finances, Statistics and Municipal Legislation. In the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 82% had the service and in the smaller ones (with up to 5 thousand people), only 10% offered services on their site. The highlight is the state of Rio de Janeiro (31%), followed by São Paulo (28%), Minas Gerais and Paraná (both with 24%).

The third most common type of service was news (traffic conditions, climate information and facts about the city), present in 11% of the municipalities. Among the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 82% had news services, and among the small ones, only 5%.

Links to other public organizations is the fourth most frequent type of service (10%). In the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 79% had the service, whereas in those with up to 5 thousand inhabitants, only 4% had a link to pages of other municipal organizations. Rio de Janeiro (31%) and São Paulo (22%) had the highest percentages. The levels in the remaining states were extremely below 20%.

Other services like bidding, ombudsmanship, access to forms, documents and files have a level of access below 10%.

Services aimed at the public are present in 32 of the 34 municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants

Of the 34 municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, 32 had public aimed at the public. The exceptions are Jaboatão dos Guararapes (PE) and Duque de Caxias (RJ). In the group ranging from 100,001 up to 500 thousand inhabitants, the level is also high (90%). In the remaining population groups, the percentage is a little lower, with almost 75% of the municipalities having the service.

The Southeast (84%), South (82%) and Central West (84%) are the regions with predominance of services. The Northeast (68%) and the North regions, with less than half of the municipalities with service offer, are the regions with lowest percentages. However, in the Northeast, Piauí (95%) and Alagoas (81%) are the highlight for offering services aimed at the public.

Most of the times, city governments choose to attend the public by telephone and fax

In relation to the services available, the most important one is the telephone, present in 71% of the Brazilian municipalities. Besides the big municipalities, the small ones also present a high percentage of this type of service. The North (45%) and Northeast (63%) regions had the lowest percentages of city governments with a conventional telephone line. In the other regions, figures were close to 80%.

The second most frequent type of service is the fax (66%). Once more, the Southeast, South and Central West regions present the highest percentages of fax machines available to serve the public, about 75%. The Northeast had a percentage slightly above 50% and the North, 37%.

The third most common type of service available was the e-mail, found in over half of the municipalities (56%). In the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants the use of e-mail is a means of communication as common as the conventional telephone. In each of the three main regions (Southeast, South and Central West), the percentage of municipalities offering the service is about 70%. The Northeast (39%) ad the North (20%) had the lowest percentages.

Other services also used by city governments are Mailing (51%), Newspapers (30%), Internet (24%) and Telephone used for serving (only 4%). In this case, due to the high costs, are only included the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants which offer he service to the public.

Security and Justice: 950 cities have City Guard

In 2004, 950 municipalities had city guards in Brazil. The municipalities with a population between 20,001 and 100 thousand inhabitants were the ones concentrating the highest percentages of such professionals. Among the regions, Northeast and Southeast have the highest number of municipalities with city guards. The highlights in these regions are the states of Bahia, where of the 417 municipalities, 188 have city guard; in São Paulo, 194 of the 645 municipalities make use of this security instrument.

The city guards were created according to the Federal Constitution of 1998, and their duties were related to the protection of public patrimony. However, it is observed that there is not a standardization of the several corps nationwide, causing a great difference among the city guards of several municipalities.

According to the survey, in several cities, the city guard performs tasks directly connected to public security. The protection of goods, services and facilities, for example, is one of the main attributions in 918 municipalities. Besides this function, the guards work for the patrimony security; in 815 they help the public; in 708 they work in the school patrol, and in 638 they help the military police.

In relation to the number of servants in the City Guard, it was observed that, of the 915 municipalities with this kind of service, 215 had up to ten guards (22.6%). A total of 110 of these municipalities are located in the Northeast and 99 have less than 30 thousand inhabitants.

In the five biggest municipalities which have a City Guard (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza and Curitiba), the number of servants reaches 12,836 guards, that is, 20% of the overall figure in the country.

As for the participation of women in the city guard, the survey shows that it is 11.7% in the country. The highest percentages of women are in Mato Grosso (23.2%), São Paulo (16.0%) and Piauí (16.0%); the lowest are in Roraima (0%), Bahia (3.9%) and Espírito Santo (9.6%).

Guns are permitted in almost 15% of municipalities having city guard

The use of guns by the City Guard is permitted in the municipalities with over 50 thousand inhabitants and in the metropolitan areas. Of the 950 municipalities which have City Guard, 139 (14.6%) permitted the use of guns. Rondônia, Amazonas, Roraima, Amapá, Tocantins, Piauí, Minas Gerais, Santa Catarina e Goiás are the states which have these military corps, but do not use guns.

Among the municipalities which have City Guard, few use guns. In the North, in 28% of the municipalities with this kind of corps, only Pará uses guns. In the Northeast, they are only 5.7% using guns; in the Southeast, 29.2%; in the South 13.7% and in the Central West, 8.7%.

The state of São Paulo is the highlight: guns are permitted in 85 (43.8%) of its 194 municipalities having city guard.

Rio de Janeiro is the state with most special courts

The special courts are subdivided into Civil and Criminal. Of the 5,460 Brazilian municipalities existing in 2004, 1,732 had special Civil courts and Criminal ones. The municipalities of the Southeast, South and part of the Northeast region are the ones concentrating the highest percentage of these courts.

Rio de Janeiro is the state with the biggest number f municipalities with both kinds of courts (77.2% of Criminal and 82.6% of Civil ones), whereas Piauí holds the lowest percentage of both (6.3% of Criminal and 6.8% of Civil courts).

The survey also shows that the bigger the number of persons living in municipalities, the bigger the offer of these services. Of the 34 municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants, four did not have a special criminal court in 2004: São Luís (MA), Feira de Santana (BA), Osasco and Santo André (both in em SP).

Women Police Stations: cities with up to 5 thousand inhabitants did not have this service in 2004

In 2004, 345 Brazilian municipalities had police stations specialized in the female public. There was at least one per state. It was observed, nonetheless, that when the size of the cities is considered, none of the 1,359 municipalities with up to 5 thousand inhabitants had this kind of service.

In the states, the percentages varied from 1.7% (Bahia) to 18.2% (Mato Grosso do Sul). In São Paulo, the first state to have a women police station, 113 (17.5%) of municipalities had the service in 2004. The Southeast region is the highlight in the region, with 10.1% of municipalities. In the Northeast region, only 2.8% had the service.

Environment: number of employees increased by 15% in two years

From 2002 to 2004, the number of municipalities with an environmental organizations increased from 3,769 to 3,953, a change from 68% to 71%.

It is common for the local administration to be connected to other areas of municipal administration. The survey showed that most of the times it occurred, these organizations were associated to the Department of Agriculture. Other environmental organizations were connected to departments of construction, health and tourism.

MUNIC also revealed that, in two years, the number of employees in the environmental area increased by 15%, changing from 29,924 to 34, 271 in all the country. The most significant increase was in the group of workers without a formal job contract, which grew by 67% and in the groups of municipalities in the South and Central West regions. The number of workers with a formal contract (statutory servants) decreased by 3%.

Most of the partnerships between cities are established in order to collect urban garbage and control water pollution

The survey informed that the establishment of partnerships through cooperation agreements, environment councils, hydrographic bay committees and partnerships between cities. The partnerships happened in 40% of municipalities, and 73% of them were signed with another public organization (federal, state or municipal).

The survey informed that the establishment of partnerships through cooperation agreements, environment councils, hydrographic bay committees and partnerships between cities. The partnerships happened in 40% of municipalities, and 73% of them were signed with another public organization (federal, state or municipal).

From 2002 to 2004, the results of MUNIC show that the number of municipalities which participated in committees of hydrographic bay increased in all regions and in all population groups. In 2004, the number of municipalities participating in it already encompassed over 50% of municipalities. The Southeast was the highlight due to the high proportion of municipalities (84%) participating in at least one committee. This result was highly influenced by the state of São Paulo, whose percentage of municipalities associated to committees amounted to 95%.

A fact which is worth mentioning is the fact that 445 Brazilian municipalities belong to more than one committee. In relation to the hydrographic bay, MUNIC shows a high proportion of municipalities participating in committees in the bays of Rio São Francisco, Costeiras do Sudeste, Costeiras do Sul and Rio da Prata. In the bay of São Francisco, for instance, 75% of the municipalities were associated to some committee; most of them located in the origin of the river. In this case it is worth mentioning that one of the attributions of committees is the administration of the use of water (acquisition and distribution).

A partnership between municipalities is another possible form of political agreement. The survey showed that, between 2002 and 2004, there was little change in the number of municipalities which declared to be part of these agreements in the environmental area (about 20% of the total). Among the most common topics, are important the disposal of solid domestic or industrial residues (garbage dumps): over 60% of municipalities dealing with this matter and with the use of natural resources (water pollution and recuperation of polluted waters). In a general way, garbage is always dumped in peripheral areas of big cities. Once it is a municipal duty, the partnerships to take care of the problem are common. Another municipal attribution is related to treatment of polluted waters. A typical case is that of the Araruama Lagoon, in Rio de Janeiro, which depends on partnership to be treated and recovered.

In 2004, 56% of Brazilian municipalities charged police power taxes

According to the Municipal Taxation Code, municipalities, states and the Union may charge police power and service rendering taxes. MUNIC showed that taxes were subdivided into six types (police power, public illumination, garbage collection, public sanitation, fire brigade and other taxes) and were more common in the big urban centers. 

In 2004, in the two biggest Brazilian cities, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, not all taxes were charged. In Rio, the charged ones were garbage collection, police power and others, but there were not taxes for public illumination, public sanitation and fire brigade. In the capital of São Paulo, the charged taxes were public illumination, garbage collection and others, but not public sanitation and fire brigade.

The public illumination tax was charged in most municipalities; it increased from 49%, in 2002, to 60.7%, in 2004. This substantial increase, of about 245, is due to the fact that this tax was transformed into an item of the Federal Constitution through the Constitutional Item # 39 from December 19, 2002 ( Article 149 – A). The remaining taxes had smaller increases, except the police power tax (related to security, hygiene, urban and social order, permission to the development of economic activities, etc.), which had an increase of 23%. In 2004, it went into effect in 56% of the Brazilian municipalities, whereas in 2002 it was present in less than half of them (45.3%).

There is also the fire brigade tax, present in 3.6% of Brazilian municipalities in 2004. It reached the proportion of 14.7% of municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants.

 

In the Southeast, the proportion of municipalities dealing with housing matters is below the national average

In 2004, MUNIC investigated the existence (on non-existence) of housing organizations or of records of families interested in housing and, if the programs eventually implemented would be exclusively dependent on the city government or carried out in partnership with another organization.

It was observed that in 42% of Brazilian municipalities there was a specific housing organization to deal with such matters. In 73% of them, there were records of needing families, a fact which represented improvement in relation to 2002, when the percentages were 37% and 68.2%, respectively. The non-existence of a specific administrative organization does not mean that the housing problem is not being considered by other municipal departments such as government divisions or the executive power itself.

According to the survey, 81% of city governments declared to have performed, during their administration, some kind of task in this sector. All the municipalities with over 500 thousand inhabitants declared to have implemented some kind of housing program such as: construction of units, offer of construction material, offer of land, urbanization and regularization of invaded land. The construction of housing units was the most common measure in these municipalities, but part of these houses were built by the city government and others through partnerships.

Of the 219 municipalities with a population ranging between 100,001 and 500 thousand inhabitants, 206 declared to have carried out some type of housing program. In the state of Rio de Janeiro, there was the implementation of housing programs in the municipalities of Campos, Mesquita and Petrólpolis. In the state of São Paulo, the highlights are the municipalities of Itabira, Barbacena, Varginha and Pouso Alegre.

Among the Major regions, in the South and in the Central West were found the highest percentages of municipalities with records of families and housing organizations. In these two regions, over 80% of the municipalities declared to have implemented housing programs. In this case, the Northeast (84%) is worth being mentioned because of the importance of the states of Sergipe and Bahia. Of the 75 municipalities in Sergipe, 73 (97%) declared to have had housing programs and 70 to have constructed units. In Paraíba, among 223 municipalities, 213 (96%) implemented housing programs and 189 constructed units. City governments did not inform the number of units constructed.

It is surprising to see the relatively low proportion of city governments with housing organizations (33%), records of needing families and housing programs (77%) in the Southeast. In this region, there are big urban centers with extreme lack of houses [1]. It is surprising to see the relatively low proportion of city governments with housing organizations (33%), records of needing families and housing programs (77%) in the Southeast. In this region, there are big urban centers with extreme lack of houses. The results found in the Southeast are below the national average. The lowest proportions of municipalities with organizations, records and programs were found in Minas Gerais and São Paulo. In Minas Gerais, 27% of the municipalities have a housing organization; 65% have a record of families and 77% implemented programs throughout the administration. In São Paulo, the results were: 33% of municipalities with a housing organization; 64% with a record of interested families and 75% with programs carried out during the administration. The state of Rio de Janeiro presented the following results: 67%, 90% and 88%, respectively.

MUNIC also investigated the legislation and the urban planning of Brazilian municipalities: the existence of a directing plan, urban perimeter law, soil separation law and laws relating to division of space or equivalent ones.

___________________________

[1] The concept "housing necesities" is used in the study Lack of Housing in Brazil,  by João Pinheiro Foundation (1995): lack of housing together with demographic demand and the inadequacy of housing.