Council Bluffs, Iowa

Council Bluffs is a city in and the county seat of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, United States and is on the east bank of the Missouri River across from what is now the much larger city of Omaha, Nebraska. It was known until 1852 as Kanesville, Iowa — the historic starting point of the Mormon Trail and eventual northernmost anchor town of the other emigrant trails.

The population of Council Bluffs was 62,230 at the 2010 census. Along with neighboring Omaha to the west, Council Bluffs was part of the 60th-largest metropolitan area in the United States in 2010, with an estimated population of 865,350 residing in the eight counties of the Omaha-Council Bluffs metropolitan area. Council Bluffs is more than a decade older than Omaha. The latter, founded in 1854 by Council Bluffs businessmen and speculators following the Kansas-Nebraska Act, has grown to be the significantly larger city.

History

1804–1843

Council Bluffs was named for an 1804 meeting of the Lewis and Clark Expedition with the Otoe tribe, which took place at Council Bluff, near present-day Fort Calhoun, Nebraska, 20 miles to the north. Council Bluffs became the generic name for the land on both sides of the Missouri River north of the mouth of the Platte River; the northwestern corner of Mills County, Iowa was then specifically called Council Bluffs.

Council

A council is a group of people who come together to consult, deliberate, or make decisions. A council may function as a legislature, especially at a town, city or county level, but most legislative bodies at the state or national level are not considered councils. At such levels, there may be no separate executive branch, and the council may effectively represent the entire government. A board of directors might also be denoted as a council. A committee might also be denoted as a council, though a committee is generally a subordinate body composed of members of a larger body, while a council may not be. Because many schools have a student council, the council is the form of governance with which many people are likely to have their first experience as electors or participants.

A member of a council may be referred to as a councillor, or by the gender-specific titles of councilman and councilwoman.

In politics

Notable examples of types of councils encountered in politics include:

Fire department

A fire department (United States and Canada) or fire brigade (United Kingdom and Commonwealth) (also known as a fire and rescue service or simply fire service) is a public or private organization that provides predominantly emergency firefighting and rescue services for a certain jurisdiction, which is typically a municipality, county, or fire protection district. A fire department usually contains one or more fire stations within its boundaries, and may be staffed by career firefighters, volunteer firefighters, or a combination thereof (referred to as a combination department).

A fire department may also provide "fire protection" or fire prevention services, whereby firefighters visit homes and give fire safety advice and fit smoke alarms for members of the public. In many countries fire protection or prevention is seen as an important role for the fire service, as preventing a fire from occurring in the first place can save lives and property.

Organization

Fire departments are organized in a system of administration, services, training, and operations; for example: