There is talk once again of splitting St. Louis County in two. People note it is the biggest county in the United States east of the Mississippi River. They argue the needs of the Iron Range are different than the needs of county seat Duluth.

Perhaps there should be talk of getting rid of a few counties in Minnesota. Some are so rural that state and local tax dollars could be saved by combining counties.

Looking at a map, it&8217;s easy to point them out.

Traverse County has only 3,799 people, according to the July 2006 census estimate. Its neighbor, Big Stone County, has 5,510. They both share the nub of the state that pokes into South Dakota. The two counties should join into one.

Red Lake County touches neither of the Red Lakes nor the Red Lake Indian Reservation, but the Red Lake River runs through it and its seat is Red Lake Falls. The problem is there are only 4,270 people in this remote county. It separated in 1896 from its large neighbor Polk County, which has 30,911 people. Red Lake County should join Polk County or perhaps Pennington County, which has 13,611 people.

Kittson County in the northwestern corner of Minnesota only has 5,043 people. It makes sense to combine it with Roseau County, which has 16,156.

The youngest county, Lake of the Woods County, which has 4,363 people, perhaps could be returned to Beltrami County if it weren&8217;t for the long drive to Bemidji.

Western border counties Lincoln, Pipestone and Rock all seem like fine candidates to join with the counties to their east.

The fact is, St. Louis County might have different needs, but so do many counties in America and for that matter states. If rivals and geographically dissimilar east and west Texas can remain one state, then north and south St. Louis County can stay one county. Upper and Lower Peninsula Michigan fall into the same category. Eastern and Western Washington state and Oregon have the same sort of discussions on splitting.

If St. Louis County&8217;s leaders want to maintain efficiency, the result of a study being considered will tell them to keep it one county.

The problem isn&8217;t big counties. The problem is small, inefficient ones. But studies aren&8217;t commissioned to fix that problem.