City Of Mists: The Departments

City of Mists: Introduction
City of Mists: The Law

Since the forced removal of president and suppression of legislative assembly, the Departments are the controlling force behind the City Of Mists with the council composed of the departments' commissars being the real ruler of the island. The council is composed of heads of five major departments, and eight minor departments. The division between major and minor departments is fluid to a degree, based on their influence and relative power, with Departments Of Finances, Department Of Harbor, and Department Of Defense having their dominant positions unchallenged since the coup.

Department Of Finances oversees taxes, customs, and bank regulations giving it leverage over banks and other corporations operating in the city. It's main source of political power is balancing city budget and assigning funds to other departments. While other major departments and some of the minor ones are usually capable of finding alternate sources of revenue to finance their operations, all the commissars prefer to remain in the Department Of Finances' good graces. They have their own investigation branch in the form of the financial inspectors, with the right of investigating any transgression that involve money or loss of public profits, and include armed arrest and seizure unit.

Department Of Harbor controls the port, the warehouse infrastructure, and the customs. having great deal of influence over corporations that trade in physical commodities. They are the most financially independent of the departments, receiving port and warehouse fees, and control tariffs flowing into the city budget. Like financial inspectors, custom inspectors have very wide array of investigative powers, armed arrest and seizure unit (trained in infiltrating and capturing ships), and the harbor watch uniformed units. They also keep a number of military-grade gunboats and two helicopters.

Department Of Defense is the military force of the island. While the army (called the militia to present itself as the citizens' force) itself is predictably small, with few thousand soldiers, its four (not very modern) tanks, four APCs, two jets, two combat helicopters, and three transport helicopters are unmatched force on the island. The department own revenue is limited to fees on weapon trade coming through the city, selling obsolete equipment, but they have big influence of companies that manufacture, test, and trade weapons, and the commissar is experienced in reminding the Department Of Finances who removed the president and gave power to the departments in the first place. While the regular troops are rather poorly trained, the small troop of gendarmes has better training, better equipment, and the widest array of legal enforcement powers.

Department Of Justice oversees criminal investigations and judiciary proceedings. It is composed of a number of judges and procurators who keep their own retinues of detectives that examine facts and gather evidence of serious crimes and are de facto plain-clothes police. Department of Justice has the lowest amount of independent revenue of the major departments, and maintains its status mainly because of the need for civil courts in the city full of corporations. It keeps a small number of uniformed guards who provide security to the department buildings, the judges, and the prison in the middle of the island.

Department Of Infrastructure is responsible for regulating new constructions, maintenance of streets, power grid, and sewerage, and retains monopoly for providing electricity and fresh water. It is the only major department that does not field investigator agents but it keeps a large force of uniformed carabiniers, second only to military, for the purpose of maintaining public peace, enforcing traffic laws, fighting fire, and fulfilling the role of uniformed police.

Minor departments include Department Of Communication And Science (mostly assigning radio frequencies to corporations), Department Of Culture And Education (a sinecure, whose sole activity is occasional extortion of money and favors from the thriving porn and sex industry via veiled threats of issuing unfavorable regulations), Department Of Fishing (which is actually a department of the territorial sea and all its resources), Department Of Health (does a little regulation, all the local health care is private), and Department Of The Island (which oversees the farming and environmental regulations, and deals with most issues on the island outside of the city).