The Legislature of Río Negro Province ( es, Legislatura de la Provincia de Río Negro) is the

unicameral Unicameralism (from ''uni''- "one" + Latin ''camera'' "chamber") is a type of legislature, which consists of one house or assembly, that legislates and votes as one. Unicameral legislatures exist when there is no widely perceived need for multic ...

legislative body A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country or city. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers of government. Laws enacted by legislatures are usually known as p ...

Río Negro Province Río Negro (, ''Black River'') is a province of Argentina, located in northern Patagonia. Neighboring provinces are from the south clockwise Chubut, Neuquén, Mendoza, La Pampa and Buenos Aires. To the east lies the Atlantic Ocean. Its capit ...

, in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. It convenes in the provincial capital, Viedma. It comprises 46 legislators, 22 of whom are elected in a single province-wide multi-member district, while the remaining 24 are elected in eight three-member districts that divide the province's territory, called "electoral circuits" (''circuitos electorales''). Its powers and responsibilities are established in the provincial constitution. Elections to the legislature take place every four years, when the entirety of its members are renewed. The legislature is presided by the Vice Governor of Río Negro, who is elected alongside the governor every four years.

History

The Legislature was established in 1958, when the National Territory of Río Negro became a

province of Argentina Argentina is subdivided into twenty-three federated states called provinces ( es, provincias, singular ''provincia'') and one called the autonomous city (''ciudad autónoma'') of Buenos Aires, which is the federal capital of the republic ( es ...

. The first legislature convened in the old building of the Teatro Argentino, in Viedma. In 1972, the military governor, Roberto Requeijo, ordered a series of renovations to better accommodate the legislature in the site of the Teatro Argentino.

Electoral districts

Legislators in both the province-wide district and the eight electoral circuits are elected through

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

using

party-list proportional representation Party-list proportional representation (list-PR) is a subset of proportional representation electoral systems in which multiple candidates are elected (e.g., elections to parliament) through their position on an electoral list. They can also be us ...

, with

D'Hondt system The D'Hondt method, also called the Jefferson method or the greatest divisors method, is a method for allocating seats in parliaments among federal states, or in party-list proportional representation systems. It belongs to the class of highest- ...

and a 5% electoral threshold. The electoral circuits do not correspond to the province's departments, but are rather divided using

municipalities A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

as its main criterion. The electoral circuits were first introduced ahead of the 1958 provincial elections, originally comprising six districts. The current distribution was established in 2013, when the electoral law was last modified.

References

External links

*
Constitution of Río Negro Province
{{DEFAULTSORT:Legislature of Río Negro 1958 establishments in Argentina Politics of Argentina Río Negro Province Río Negro