What are the powers and functions of the mayors; There are 221 municipalities in Ecuador

A total of 13,450,047 Ecuadorians are summoned to exercise their right to vote in the elections on February 5.

The objective of the election is to elect 23 provincial prefects and vice-prefects, 221 mayors864 urban councillors, 443 rural councillors, 4,109 members of the parish councils and 7 main and alternate councilors of the Council for Citizen Participation and Social Control (CPCCS).

Powers and functions of the mayor

Its functions are established in article 60 of the Cootad, among the main ones are:

• Be the legal representative of that level of government and exercise exclusive executive power.
• Call and preside over the sessions of the Municipal Council for which it must also propose the agenda.
• Submit municipal ordinance projects to the Council and tax that create, modify, exonerate or suppress taxes within the canton.
• Design an annual operating plan and its corresponding institutional budget statement and the administrative management model, through which the cantonal development plan, urban planning plans, and public works must be executed.
• Delegate powers and obligations to the vice mayor or vice mayor, councilors, councilors and officials, in addition to those already established in the Law.
• Sign contracts and approval of transfers of budget items.
• Dictate urgent and transitory measures in case of a serious emergency, and report them to the Council.
• Coordinate with the National Police, the community and other organizations the formulation and execution of local policies and plans on prevention, protection and citizen security.
• Present to the Council and to the citizens an annual written report in which they render accounts of their management. The report must include the status of the services and public works that have been carried out, the procedures that were used in their execution and the costs.
• Organize municipal control agents.

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Powers and functions of councilors

In Ecuador there are 221 municipalities, but only one metropolitan district, which is Quito. The Cootad establishes two types of councils under these two categories, municipal and metropolitan, but their functions are the same and they are made up of councilors elected at the polls. The number varies according to the amount of urban and rural population, in the capital there are 21, while in Guayaquil there are 15.

Its main functions are specified in article 58 and are:

• Supervise the management of the mayor or mayoress and elect, from among its members, the vice mayor or vice mayoress.
• Decide the dismissal, with the vote —according to two thirds of its members—, of the mayor or mayor or deputy mayor or deputy mayor and of the councilors who have incurred in some prohibitions provided for by the regulations.
• The intervention with voice and vote in the sessions and deliberations of the Metropolitan Council.
• Approve the metropolitan development plan and the territorial ordering plan.
• Approve and observe the budget of the metropolitan autonomous government, which must be consistent with the metropolitan development and territorial planning plan and guarantee citizen participation in which the collective interests of the district are represented within the framework of the Constitution and the Law. Also must approve or observe the budget liquidation of the previous year, with due reforms.
• Form the permanent, special and technical commissions that are necessary, respecting the proportionality of the existing urban and rural political and population representation within it, and approve the formation of occasional commissions suggested by the metropolitan mayor or mayoress.
• Regulate, through an ordinance, the delimitation of urban neighborhoods and parishes taking into account the territorial configuration, identity, history, urban planning and administrative needs and the application of the principle of inter-neighborhood equity.

The ballots that must be filled out this February 5 in the Ecuadorian elections

Powers of the president and members of the parish councils

In Ecuador there are 1,499 parishes in Ecuador (1,140 rural and 359 urban).

Article 70 of the Cootad specifies the powers of the president of the rural parish council, among the most relevant are:

• Call and preside with voice and vote the sessions of the rural parish council, for which he must propose the agenda in advance.
• Submit projects of agreements, resolutions and regulations to the parish council.
• Direct the elaboration of the parish development plan and the territorial ordering plan, in accordance with the cantonal and provincial development plan.
• Participatively prepare the annual operating plan and the corresponding institutional budget statement in accordance with the rural parish plan for development and territorial ordering.
• Decide the administrative management model through which the rural parish development and territorial planning plan must be executed.
• Sign contracts, agreements and instruments that commit the Rural Parochial Decentralized Autonomous Government, in accordance with the Law.
• Coordinate a citizen security plan, in accordance with the reality of each rural parish and in harmony with the cantonal and national plan for citizen security, articulating, for this purpose, the rural parish government, the central government through the corresponding body, the citizenry and the National Police.
• Article 68 of the Cootad also establishes the functions of the members of the parish council, these are the most relevant:
• Intervene with voice and vote in the sessions and deliberations of the rural parish council.
• The presentation of draft agreements and resolutions, in the field of competence of the rural government.
• Supervise the actions of the parish executive and fulfill those functions that are expressly entrusted to it. (YO)