According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of, of which is land and is water. The largest portion of Cuyahoga Valley National Park is located in the northern part of the county. The southern border of the former Connecticut Western Reserve passes through the southern part of the county, leading to jogs in the east and west borders of the county.
Summit County, along with Cuyahoga County, is one of two of Ohio's 88 counties that have a charter government, as authorized by Article X of the Ohio Constitution. Under its charter, rather than three elected commissioners, Summit County has an elected County Executive and an eleven-member County Council. Eight members of the council are elected from individual districts the other three are elected at large. Summit County also has an appointed Medical Examiner rather than an elected Coroner, and an elected Fiscal Officer, who exercises the powers and performs the duties of a county auditor, treasurer and recorder. The remaining officials are similar to the officials in other counties. They include the following:
Summit County currently has 14 Common Pleas judges. They are:
Kelly McLaughlin,
Kathryn Michael,
Christine Croce,
Amy Corrigall Jones,
Alison McCarty,
Tammy O'Brien,
Joy Oldfield,
Mary Margaret Rowlands,
Alison Breaux, and
Susan Baker Ross
Linda Tucci Teodosio
Katarina Cook
John P. Quinn
Elinore Marsh Stormer
Summit County Council
Summit County has an 11-member council. Three members are elected at-large in mid-term cycles, while eight members are elected from districts coinciding with the Presidential election. The current members of Summit County Council are:
As of the 2010 Census, there were 541,781 people, 222,781 households, and 141,110 families residing in the county. The population density was. There were 245,109 housing units at an average density of. The racial makeup of the county was 80.6% white, 14.4% black or African American, 2.2% Asian, 0.2% American Indian, 0.5% from other races, and 2.1% from two or more races. Those of Hispanic or Latino origin made up 1.6% of the population. In terms of ancestry, 24.9% were German, 15.3% were Irish, 10.6% were English, 10.1% were Italian, 5.1% were Polish, and 4.5% were American. Of the 222,781 households, 29.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 45.3% were married couples living together, 13.6% had a female householder with no husband present, 36.7% were non-families, and 30.0% of all households were made up of individuals. The average household size was 2.39 and the average family size was 2.98. The median age was 40.0 years. The median income for a household in the county was $47,926 and the median income for a family was $62,271. Males had a median income of $47,892 versus $35,140 for females. The per capita income for the county was $26,676. About 10.0% of families and 13.8% of the population were below the poverty line, including 19.8% of those under age 18 and 8.0% of those age 65 or over.
Politics
Like most of Northeast Ohio, Summit is heavily Democratic. It has only voted Republican three times since 1932, all in national Republican landslides– Dwight D. Eisenhower's 1956 victory, and the 49-state sweeps by Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan in 1972 and 1984, respectively.
Education
School districts
School Districts in Summit County do not strictly follow City and Township Corporation limits or township borders. Many School Districts in Summit County overlap community borders. Below is a list of all public school districts in Summit County, Ohio.
