To understand how government in Philadelphia works, a good place to start is the 1951 Home Rule Charter, which serves as the city’s constitution and lays out much of the structure of elected officials, departments and processes.

As specified in the charter, the mayor is directly elected by voters for a four-year term and can serve up to two terms. The mayor is the only term-limited city official. Mayor Cherelle Parker, a former state representative and councilmember, took office in January 2024.

Our legislative body is the City Council, which consists of 17 members. Ten district councilmembers are elected by voters in their respective geographic districts, and seven at-large councilmembers are elected citywide. Like all of the municipal officials listed here, they serve four-year terms.

Mayoral vetoes are rare; Parker has yet to issue one. Council can override a veto with two-thirds vote. 

City Council elects one of its members to serve as council president. That’s currently Kenyatta Johnson, who has represented the 2nd District since 2012 and became president in January 2024. 

The council president is in charge of keeping council running smoothly, presides at meetings of the full council, and serves as council’s main liaison with the mayor’s administration.

Minority seats, resign-to-run, and councilmanic prerogative

One quirk laid out in the charter is that two At-Large seats are reserved for non-majority parties on council. 

Democrats have long had the majority of seats, and for decades Republicans held those two reserved positions. However, in the last two elections, members of the Working Families Party won first one and then both of those spots. 

There is now only one Republican on council, 10th District Councilmember Brian O’Neill.

Another notable feature of the city’s basic law is the resign-to-run rule. It requires any city employee or elected official who wants to run for any office — other than for reelection — to quit their job first. One effect is that when there’s an open race for mayor, which generally occurs every eight years, a few councilmembers typically step down to run, which results in new faces joining the legislative body.

There have been a few attempts to eliminate or modify the resign-to-run rule, but none has succeeded so far.

For the charter to be amended, council must put a measure on the ballot and it has to receive yes votes from a majority of voters. Some recent votes created an Office of Homeless Services ombudsperson, an Office of Prison Oversight, and a minimum budget for the Housing Trust Fund (which supports creation of affordable housing). Philadelphia voters usually approve ballot measures.

There’s one significant characteristic of Philadelphia’s government that is not mentioned in the charter. That’s the tradition of councilmanic prerogative, under which district councilmembers have broad authority to decide which development projects happen in their respective districts. 

It’s largely a form of legislative courtesy: on zoning, planning, street and land disposition issues in a district, the rest of council always votes as the district councilmember wishes (with rare exceptions). The Planning Department and other agencies also defer to the member, effectively giving them veto power over land-use decisions.

Police, fire and other departments

One of City Council’s top responsibilities is to review, modify, and pass the mayor’s proposed budget, a process that typically runs from March, when the budget is presented, through the end of June, the deadline for passage. 

The city’s fiscal year runs from July 1 to June 30. The fiscal 2026 budget currently in effect is $6.8 billion.

A state entity called the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority, or PICA, provides financial oversight and ensures the city sticks to its five-year financial plans. 

The city had nearly 29,000 employees as of September 2025, according to a Parker administration financial report. The largest agency is the police department, with about 5,500 uniformed officers and 900 civilian employees. The fire department has 2,800 firefighters and 140 other employees. 

The city courts and the city-owned Water Department each have about 2,100 full-time staffers, the prisons and the Sanitation department each have 1,700, Human Services (child welfare) has 1,468, the Free Library and Public Health each have 900, and Philadelphia International Airport has 850. 

The District Attorney’s office prosecutes most criminal cases in the city and has about 700 employees. DA Larry Krasner won reelection to a third four-year term in November 2025.

The row offices

Philadelphia has a few other elected positions called the row offices: Sheriff, City Controller, Register of Wills and the City Commissioners.

The Sheriff’s Office provides court security, transports prisoners to court, arrests people who have warrants, and conducts sheriff’s sales of foreclosed properties. The sheriff oversees a staff of 340. Sheriff Rochelle Bilal took office in 2020 and was reelected in 2024.

The City Controller is an independent fiscal watchdog, in charge of auditing city departments and the School District, investigating allegations of fraud at agencies and their contractors, and reviewing the five-year plan. The controller also sits on several boards, like the Board of Pensions and the Sinking Fund Commission, which oversees Philadelphia Gas Works’ pension plan.

City Controller Christy Brady was appointed on an acting basis in 2022. She later won an election to serve out an unfinished term, and was elected to her first full term in November 2025.

The Register of Wills issues marriage licenses, probates wills, keeps records, oversees inheritance taxes, and is clerk of the Orphans’ Court. Register of Wills John Sabatina took office in January 2024.

The three City Commissioners make up the Board of Elections. They handle voter registration and run elections. At least one commissioner must be a member of a minority party, i.e., not the party with the most registered voters in the city. The board selects one of its members as the chair. 

The city government also includes numerous department heads and members of various boards, including the nine-member School Board. Many of those officials are nominated by the mayor and confirmed by City Council.

Local courts

The local court system, called the First Judicial District of Pennsylvania, is composed of two courts: the Court of Common Pleas and Municipal Court.

Municipal Court is a trial court that is divided into three divisions: criminal, civil and traffic. It handles landlord and tenant cases, small claims cases worth up to $12,000, and code enforcement cases up to $15,000. The criminal division processes all arrests, and it holds summary and misdemeanor trials and felony case preliminary hearings. The traffic division handles violations like speeding and driving with a broken headlight, but not parking tickets or serious crimes like DUIs.

Municipal Court has 27 judges who are elected for 6-year terms, including an administrative judge and president judge

The Court of Common Pleas is a general trial jurisdiction court with 101 judges, headed by a president judge and three administrative judges who head the trial, family, and Orphans Court divisions. They are elected to 10-year terms.

The trial division handles most felony criminal cases, and major civil cases where the contested amount exceeds $12,000. The family division is responsible for domestic relations matters, like divorce, paternity, custody, child support and domestic violence, and juvenile cases like delinquency, dependency, and adoptions. The Orphans’ Court division conducts proceedings involving estates, wills and trusts.