The county is under the school-board jurisdiction, but at Kirkwall and Stromness there are public schools giving secondary education.
The number of members of the school-board was in 1905 reduced from twenty-four to five, elected by the city at large, or serving for one, two or three years; at the same time power was centralized in the hands of the superintendent of schools.
Each municipality is required to pay to its school board 25% of its receipts from the general property tax.
The police force of each municipality, or rather of each of 66 police districts, is maintained and controlled by the insular government; justice in each municipality is also administered by the insular government; the building, maintenance and repair of public roads are under the management of a board of three road supervisors in each of the seven insular election districts; and matters pertaining to education are for the most part under the insular commissioner of education and a school board of three members elected biennially in each municipality; nearly all other local affairs are within the jurisdiction of the mayor and municipal council.
In 1870 and again in 1813 he was elected on the London school board.
