The head of the county is the Lord-Lieutenant. Next to him is the Vice-Lieutenant and a large number of Deputy-Lieutenants and Justices of the Peace, but the chief administrative body is the County Council, which consists of 65 members. These elect the chairman and vice-chairman, who are designated respectively convener and vice-convener. County Councils were first established in 1889. The county is divided into districts, and each district has so many divisions, or parishes, which elect one councillor. Aberdeenshire has 85 parishes, which are grouped in eight districts: (1) Deer with fifteen electoral divisions, (2) Ellon with seven, (3) Garioch with six, (4) Deeside with six, (5) Turriff with seven, (6) Aberdeen with nine, (7) Alford with four, and (8) Huntly with four, making fifty-eight electoral divisions in all. The powers of the Council are to maintain roads and bridges, to administer the Contagious Diseases (Animals) Acts, to appoint a medical officer of health and a sanitary inspector, to deal with the pollution of rivers and to see to the protection of wild birds. Previous to the passing of the Act of 1889 the Commissioners of Supply were the chief governing body. They are still retained but have no jurisdiction, except in so far as they elect members to the Standing Joint Committee. This committee includes representatives from the County Council appointed annually and from the Commissioners of Supply, together with the Sheriff _ex officio_. The Standing Joint Committee has charge of the Police and controls all the capital expenditure in the county. Each district has a district committee consisting of the county councillors for the divisions of the district and of parish councillors selected by each parish council of the district. Each parish has in this way two representatives on the district committee, one elected by the electors and the other appointed by the parish council. This district committee is the local authority for administering the Public Health Acts, but has no power to raise money—that being the function of the County Council as a whole. By a later Act of 1894, a parish council was established in every parish. The number of councillors in landward parishes is fixed by the County Council and in burghal parishes by the Town Council. The parish council looks after the Poor Law and must provide for pauper lunatics, sees to the levying of the school rate, to the administration of the Vaccination Acts, and to the appointment of Registrars. The affairs of the county are therefore divided amongst three bodies, the County Council, the District Committees and the Parish Councils. Prior to 1890 the powers of local administration lay with the Commissioners of Supply, the Road Trustees and the Parochial Boards, whose functions are now vested in these other bodies.