Minor civil division
Minor civil division
A minor civil division (MCD) is a term the U.S. Census Bureau uses for the main governmental or administrative parts inside a county or county-like area. These are usually municipalities such as cities, towns, or civil townships. Some MCDs have their own government; others are simply areas used for statistical purposes.
What MCDs are for
MCDs help the Census Bureau collect and present data about local areas. They can be places with self-government or non-governing areas used only for statistics. The exact form of MCDs varies by state.
Where MCDs exist
As of the 2010 census, MCDs exist in 29 states, plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. In states that don’t use state-defined MCDs for census purposes, the Census Bureau uses Census County Divisions (CCDs) instead.
How MCD boundaries work
If a single MCD spans more than one county, the Census typically treats it as separate MCDs in each county. For water areas that don’t belong to any MCD, a default code is used. This often happens with parts of oceans or the Great Lakes outside state boundaries.
Examples of forms by state
- Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin often use townships and cities as MCDs.
- Louisiana uses parish districts (often for elections) and sometimes a single city.
- New York uses cities and towns; Virginia uses independent cities; West Virginia uses magisterial districts; Tennessee uses county commissioner districts (non-governing); Puerto Rico uses barrios.
- Other states have their own mix of towns, townships, cities, and special districts as the MCD framework.
A note on Palau
The U.S. Census also carries out its own census in Palau, treating the country as a county-equivalent while its states are used as MCDs for census purposes.
In short, MCDs are the Census Bureau’s way of organizing many local areas inside counties for statistical data, with the exact structure varying widely from state to state.
This page was last edited on 29 January 2026, at 06:14 (CET).