Local leadership shapes public services, budgets, and community priorities. These statistics describe who holds municipal and county leadership roles, how representation has changed, how long council members serve, what major-city council members earn, and the scale of state and local government employment. The figures cover the United States, selected major cities, and Utah government organizations, with measurement dates ranging from 2011 to March 2024.
Contents
- Women in municipal and statewide leadership
- Mayors of large U.S. cities
- City council representation and tenure
- Local council compensation
- Women in Utah local-government leadership
- Leadership levels and community setting in Utah
- The size of the public-sector workforce
Women in municipal and statewide leadership
Women held 433 of the 1,616 mayoral or mayoral-function positions in U.S. places with more than 30,000 residents as of May 2024. That was 26.8% of the positions. The figure comes from Women Mayors in U.S. Cities 2024, which counts officials serving in qualifying places rather than all local elected offices nationwide.
The broader municipal picture was somewhat different. Women held 32.7% of municipal offices in cities with populations above 10,000, while men held 66.3%, according to Women in State and Local Politics. These percentages describe municipal offices, not only mayoralties, so they should not be compared as though they measured the same group of positions.
Representation was higher in the city councils examined by Pew Charitable Trusts. Across 15 major city councils, women held 47% of seats in 2024, compared with 31% in 2016. Six of those 15 councils had majority-female representation in 2024; none did in 2016. This comparison indicates a substantial change within that selected group of councils, but it is not a national estimate for every local governing body.
Women held 33.6% of state legislative seats nationwide and 31.6% of statewide elective executive offices. Women made up 28% of governors, with 14 women governors counted: 10 Democrats and four Republicans. These figures are statewide measures and therefore provide context for local leadership without being local-government percentages themselves. (Women in State and Local Politics.)
The statewide elective executive count also included five Asian American/Pacific Islander women, nine Black women, one Native American woman, and seven Latina women. The five Asian American/Pacific Islander officeholders included four Democrats and one Republican. All nine Black women were Democrats. The Native American woman was a Democrat, while the seven Latina women included five Democrats and two Republicans. (Women in State and Local Politics.)
Political-party patterns were also reported for women state legislators. Nearly two-thirds of women state legislators were Democrats, while women were just over 20% of Republican state legislators. About one-third of women state legislators were Republicans. The descriptions use the source’s rounded wording and refer to state legislators, not municipal officeholders. (Women in State and Local Politics.)
Mayors of large U.S. cities
The 2024 mayoral data show women leading several of the country’s largest cities. The list below uses the population and rank reported by Women Mayors in U.S. Cities 2024 for U.S. places over 30,000 population.
| City and mayor | Population represented | U.S. city rank |
|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles — Karen Bass | 3,970,219 | 2nd |
| Phoenix — Kate Gallego | 1,708,127 | 5th |
| Philadelphia — Cherelle Parker | 1,578,487 | 6th |
| Fort Worth — Mattie Parker | 927,720 | 12th |
| Jacksonville — Donna Deegan | 920,570 | 13th |
| Charlotte — Vi Lyles | 900,350 | 15th |
| San Francisco — London Breed | 866,606 | 17th |
| Washington, D.C. — Muriel Bowser | 712,816 | 21st |
| Boston — Michelle Wu | 691,531 | 23rd |
| Las Vegas — Carolyn Goodman | 662,368 | 26th |
Women were mayors of 41 of the 100 most populous U.S. cities, according to Women in State and Local Politics. The city examples above show the population scale represented by several women mayors, from Los Angeles at 3,970,219 residents to Las Vegas at 662,368. Population and rank are reported attributes for the named cities; they are not estimates of the number of people directly affected by a mayoral decision.
City council representation and tenure
Representation is only one way to describe local leadership. Tenure indicates how long council members remain in office on average, and the Pew Charitable Trusts comparison found shorter average tenure across the 15 major city councils it examined. Average tenure was 4.7 years in 2024, down from 6.2 years in 2016.
The city-level figures show that the change was not uniform. Philadelphia’s average council tenure fell to 6.9 years in 2024 from 15.5 years in 2011. Boston had the lowest average tenure among the comparison cities in 2024, at 1.9 years, compared with 7.7 years in 2011.
| Measure | Earlier period | Later period |
|---|---|---|
| Average tenure across 15 councils | 6.2 years (2016) | 4.7 years (2024) |
| Philadelphia average tenure | 15.5 years (2011) | 6.9 years (2024) |
| Boston average tenure | 7.7 years (2011) | 1.9 years (2024) |
| Women’s share of seats across 15 councils | 31% (2016) | 47% (2024) |
| Councils with majority-female representation | 0 (2016) | 6 (2024) |
The tenure figures are averages across council members in the comparison and should not be read as the length of a standard council term. They describe the average time members had served at the relevant measurement point. The representation figures describe the share of seats held by women in the same selected set of councils. (Pew Charitable Trusts.)
Local council compensation
Council salary levels varied widely across the 15 cities in the Pew Charitable Trusts comparison. Los Angeles had the highest average council salary, at $231,802. San Antonio had the lowest, at $47,177. These are average council salaries for the comparison cities, not a national average and not necessarily the salary of every member in each city.
Across the 15 cities, average council salaries increased 27% since 2016. The largest reported city-level increase was in San Diego, where average council salary rose 130%, from $75,400 in 2016 to $174,400 in 2024. San Jose’s average council salary rose 74%, from $84,400 in 2016 to $147,000 in 2024.
| City or group | Salary measure | Period or change |
|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles | $231,802 average | 2024 comparison |
| San Antonio | $47,177 average | 2024 comparison |
| 15-city comparison | 27% increase in average salaries | Since 2016 |
| San Diego | $75,400 to $174,400 | 2016 to 2024; 130% increase |
| San Jose | $84,400 to $147,000 | 2016 to 2024; 74% increase |
The salary and tenure measures describe different aspects of local office. A city may have relatively short average tenure and relatively high or low compensation; the supplied figures do not establish a causal relationship between those measures. (Pew Charitable Trusts.)
Women in Utah local-government leadership
Utah data provide a more detailed look at leadership inside city, town, and county governments. In Utah city and town governments, women held 29.8% of supervisory, managerial, and executive leadership positions in 2024, up from 29.1% in 2020. Across Utah as a whole, women held 41.4% of leadership positions, while women held 45.7% of county leadership positions. These measures cover leadership positions as defined by the USU UWLP Updates Research on Women Leaders in Government, rather than only elected offices.
County results varied substantially. Emery County had the highest reported share of women leaders, at 60.9%. Tooele County had 58.8%, Morgan County 56.3%, Salt Lake County 53.2%, and San Juan County 51.0%.
At the lower end of the reported county figures, Piute County had 12.5% women leaders, Juab County had 18.2%, Box Elder County had 23.4%, and Sevier County had 27.3%. The spread between the highest and lowest reported counties is a descriptive difference in the source’s 2024 county leadership measure; the figures do not explain why the shares differ.
Only 13.7% of city manager posts in Utah cities and towns were held by women in 2024, although that was up from 5.2% in 2020. Because city manager posts are a specific role, this percentage is not interchangeable with the broader 29.8% figure for supervisory, managerial, and executive leadership positions. (USU UWLP Updates Research on Women Leaders in Government.)
Leadership levels and community setting in Utah
The Utah research also separated city-government leadership by level. Women held 27.7% of top leadership roles, 38.8% of executive-level roles, 29.0% of senior-level roles, and 20.9% of front-line leadership roles in Utah city governments in 2024. The categories represent different organizational levels, so they should be read separately rather than added together.
The research reported that about 37.2% of women leaders in Utah city and town governments were in urban areas and about 27.1% were in rural communities. Those percentages describe the setting of women leaders within the reported local-government leadership data, not the percentage of all urban or rural leadership positions held by women.
Organization size was another reported dimension. Women leaders served in organizations with 0–19 employees at a rate of 39.5%, while 33.3% served in organizations with 20–59 employees. The supplied figures do not provide the distribution for every organization-size category, so these two percentages should not be treated as a complete breakdown. (USU UWLP Updates Research on Women Leaders in Government.)
Taken together, the Utah figures show why the definition of local leadership matters. A measure of city managers can look very different from a measure covering supervisory, managerial, and executive roles. County leadership, city leadership, organizational size, and leadership level each describe a different slice of community institutions.
The size of the public-sector workforce
Leadership operates within a large government workforce. In March 2024, state and local governments employed 19.9 million people, according to the Census ASPEP Summary Report 2024. That figure was a 2.5% increase from 19.4 million in 2023.
The Census ASPEP Summary Report 2023 reported that state and local governments employed 19.6 million people in March 2023, up 1.9% from 19.2 million in 2022. The two reports use different year-over-year comparisons: the 2024 report compares March 2024 with March 2023, while the 2023 report compares March 2023 with March 2022.
| March measurement | State and local government employment | Reported comparison |
|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 19.2 million | Baseline in 2023 report |
| 2023 | 19.6 million | Up 1.9% from 2022 |
| 2024 | 19.9 million | Up 2.5% from 2023 |
These employment totals describe people employed by state and local governments, not the number of elected officials or leadership positions. They provide scale for the institutions in which local leadership decisions are implemented. The figures are measured in March and are reported as totals; they are not forecasts. (Census ASPEP Summary Report 2024; Census ASPEP Summary Report 2023.)