Civic Academy
Chapter Government & the Local Governance Act (Title 26) 101
≈ 6 min read · or listen, or skim the bold lines
How the 110 chapters work — and what “certified” really means
Most people on the Navajo Nation don’t deal with Window Rock day to day. They deal with the chapter house — the local building where you go for a homesite lease, a grazing question, a community meeting, or help with a project. The chapter is the grassroots unit of Navajo government, and the law that runs it is Title 26 of the Navajo Nation Code, the Local Governance Act — almost always shortened to the LGA.
In one line: The chapter house is local government. Title 26 — the Local Governance Act — is the law that says how much a chapter can do on its own.
What a chapter is
There are 110 chapters across the Navajo Nation, grouped into five agencies. A chapter has elected officials — a president, vice president, secretary-treasurer, and a grazing official — and holds regular community meetings where residents can speak and vote on local matters. For most families, the chapter is the level of government they actually touch.
The LGA, passed in 1998, was meant to push real decision-making down to that level — to let communities govern more of their own affairs instead of routing every decision up to the central government.
Certified vs. non-certified — the key distinction
This is the difference candidates were asked about again and again. The LGA lets a chapter become certified by adopting a required set of financial and management controls — often called the “Five Management System” (records, personnel, property, procurement, and fund management) — and having them reviewed and approved.
A certified chapter earns expanded authority: it can do its own land-use planning, issue its own home- and business-site leases, enter contracts, and appropriate its own funds. A non-certified chapter has to route many of those same decisions back through the central government in Window Rock. Certification, in plain terms, is how much of its own land and money a community gets to run.
Learn more · For how Title 26 sits alongside the central government, see Title 2 & Title 26 →The tension: autonomy vs. oversight
Across the interviews, candidates described a real pull in two directions. On one side is local autonomy — the idea that communities know their own needs and should be trusted to act. On the other is oversight — the central government’s worry about mismanagement, liability, and money that isn’t properly tracked.
Several candidates argued Window Rock has been slow to let go of power, and that the LGA can act like an unfunded mandate — asking chapters to meet high standards without the staff, training, or money to do it. Others noted the flip side: that some caution is warranted, and that the answer is to differentiate the kinds of decisions a chapter makes. A local service contract is not the same as a deal over oil or natural gas; a few candidates suggested letting chapters handle the small, local agreements while keeping the big resource decisions at the central level.
Why this matters · When a candidate is asked whether they know the difference between a certified and non-certified chapter, it is really a question about whether they understand how local self-government actually works.Why it’s in the 2026 conversation
Almost every “bring it closer to the people” promise runs through Title 26 — economic development, homesite leases, local projects, and how quickly a community can act. Candidates were also asked about older ideas like regionalization (grouping services at a regional level) versus local empowerment (pushing authority all the way down to the chapter). Knowing which one a candidate means, and whether they can name the certification process, tells you how concretely they’ve thought about local government.
The short version
Title 26 is the Local Governance Act — the law for the 110 chapters, the local level of Navajo government. A certified chapter can run its own leases, contracts, and money; a non-certified one routes those decisions through Window Rock. The recurring debate is how much autonomy to give communities, and how much oversight to keep.
Terms on this page are defined in the glossary.
Why Now — why is Title 26 in the 2026 conversation? It decides who wins the presidencyIt shapes how much power communities have over their own land and moneyIt sets the price of gas It governs local self-government — leases, contracts, and local decisions — so the certified/non-certified question is really about how much authority communities hold.Quick check
Check your understanding — private, no grades
Chapters matter to everyday life because…
Right — and chapter meetings are where your voice is loudest.
Continue
All Civic Academy lessons · Task Guides · My Civic Journey
Your voice: today’s Corner question · all surveys, by subject · the data so far.
Quick check — the law behind it
Check your understanding — private, no grades
To become certified under the Local Governance Act, a chapter must adopt…
Yes. Certification, in plain terms, is how much of its own land and money a community gets to run.
Since 2014, how many times has Title 26 been amended, per the government’s own index?
Once. The law for all 110 chapters has been essentially frozen. C · OLS amendment index
A candidate said certified chapters no longer go through the Auditor General. Should the site publish that as fact?
No. A separate resolution appears to have centralized chapter project oversight. Claims are labeled as claims. The Seams →
A certified chapter may enact a sales tax ordinance. Which resolution changed the vote requirement?
CJN-48-20. Local money authority grows with certification — which is why the audit question matters.
What 27 of the 42 candidates actually said about chapters and certification: the chapters article →