Unorganized borough
| Unorganized Borough, Alaska | |
|---|---|
 Location in the U.S. state of Alaska |
|
 Alaska's location in the U.S. |
|
| Seat | None |
| Largest community | Bethel |
| Area | |
| • Total | 323,440 sq mi (837,706 km2) |
| Population | |
| • (2000) | 81,803 |
| Time zone | Alaska: UTC-9/-8 |
The Unorganized Borough is the part of the U.S. state of Alaska not contained in any of its 19 organized boroughs. It encompasses nearly half of Alaska's area, 323,440 square miles (837,700 km2), an area larger than any other U.S. state, and larger than the land area of the smallest 16 states combined. As of the 2000 U.S. Census, it had a population of 81,803, 13% of the population of the state.
Unique among the United States, Alaska is not entirely subdivided into organized county equivalents. To facilitate census taking in the vast unorganized area, the United States Census Bureau, in cooperation with the state, divided the Unorganized Borough into 11 census areas beginning with the 1970 census. Currently, after Petersburg Census Area was made a borough, there are 10 census areas in the Unorganized Borough:
This vast area has no local-level government other than that of school districts and municipalities within its limits. Many of the villages do have tribal governments, however. Except within some incorporated cities, all government services in the Unorganized Borough, including law enforcement, are provided by the state or by the Tribal government. School districts in the Unorganized Borough are operated either by cities, in those limited instances when the city has chosen to undertake those powers, or through the general guidance of the state Department of Education under the auspices of Rural Education Attendance Areas (see below).
During the 1950s, when the push for the territory of Alaska to become a state was at its height, the presence of municipal government was extremely limited and scattered. Territory-wide, there were no more than a few dozen incorporated cities, and a small handful of service districts, broken into public utility districts and independent school districts. The service districts were authorized by the territorial legislature in 1935 to allow unincorporated areas limited powers to provide services and to tax for them.
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