North Carolina is divided into 100 counties that vary in population from 4,251 residents to 894,290, as of 2009, according to the state's Office of State Budget and Management (OSBM). Each county is led by a commissioner and a board of commissioners elected by residents and is responsible for services such as tax administration, local elections, social services and libraries.
Bordered by the Great Smoky Mountains, Cherokee County is North Carolina's most westerly county and its neighbors include Clay, Graham, Swain and Macon counties. Populations of these counties range from 8,000 in Graham to more than 34,000 in Macon, according to OSBM in 2009. Traveling east, the next six counties include Jackson, Transylvania, Haywood, Madison, Buncombe and Henderson, which is bisected by Interstate 26. Yancey County is bordered to the west by Tennessee and to the east by Mitchell, McDowell, Avery and Burke counties. Polk, Rutherford, Cleveland and Gaston counties comprise the southern border of North Carolina where it meets South Carolina. Traveling north toward the Virginia border are the counties of Lincoln, Catawba, Alexander, Wilkes, Watauga, Ashe and Alleghany. Iredell County has 157,000 residents, as of 2009, and spans 574 square miles in central North Carolina, according to the county's website.
Central North Carolina includes cities such as Winston-Salem, Greensboro, Durham, located in Durham County, and Raleigh, located in Wake County. Northcentral counties bordering Virginia include Surry, Stokes, Rockingham, Caswell, Person, Granville, Vance and Warren. South of Surry is the county of Yadkin, population 37,000, and Davie, population 41,000, as of 2009 and Forsyth County, home of Winston-Salem, is located east of Davie and south of Stokes. Guilford County has a population of 475,000 due to Greensboro's influence, and Alamance and Orange counties are east of Guilford and have well over 100,000 residents each. Counties located in the middle of the state include Rowan, Davidson, Randolph, Chatham, Cabarrus, Stanly, Montgomery, Moore, Lee, Harnett and Cumberland, home of Fayettesville. The city of Charlotte contributes to Mecklenburg county's 894,000 residents, which borders South Carolina. Other south-central counties bordering South Carolina traveling east include Union, Anson, Richmond, Scotland, Hoke, Robeson, Columbus and Bladen.
The Atlantic Ocean forms the eastern border of North Carolina, providing beach access to residents and visitors of counties such as Brunswick, New Hanover, Pender, Onslow and Carteret. Other coastal counties, traveling north toward Virginia, include Craven, Pamlico, Beaufort, Hyde, Dare, Tyrrell, Chowan, Perquimans, Pasquotank, Camden and Currituck, which is the most northeastern county in North Carolina. Counties bordering Virginia traveling west from Currituck and Camden include Gates, Hertford, Northampton and Halifax. Moving south, the counties of Nash, Edgecombe, Martin, Bertie, Washington, Wilson and Pitt, home of Greenville and more than 152,000 residents, according to Pitt County's website. Other eastern counties of North Carolina include Johnston, Sampson, Duplin, Wayne, Wilson, Lenoir, Greene and Jones, a smaller county of 10,000 residents located near the Atlantic coast.
