Contact

Reaching the right resource matters more than most people realize until they need one. This page explains how to connect with this office, what information makes a message useful, and which other reference properties cover adjacent topics in North Dakota state affairs — including one focused on the broader machinery of state government.

How to reach this office

The most direct path is a written message submitted through the contact form on this site. Written inquiries allow for a precise, documented response — which turns out to be more useful than a phone call when the question involves policy details, jurisdictional boundaries, or public records.

For questions that touch on North Dakota state government structure, agency responsibilities, or legislative matters, the North Dakota Government Authority is the appropriate companion resource. It covers the organizational architecture of state government — how agencies relate to each other, how the executive branch is structured, and where specific functions live within the system. If a question sits at the boundary between general state information and formal government process, that resource is worth checking before drafting an inquiry here.

Additional contact options

Depending on the nature of the inquiry, a few routing distinctions are worth knowing:

1. General state information — questions about geography, demographics, counties, or cities are best directed to this office via the contact form.
2. Government agency inquiries — questions involving a specific North Dakota agency, the Legislative Assembly, or the Governor's Office should go directly to those bodies. Each has its own public-facing contact process.
3. County-level questions — North Dakota's 53 counties each maintain independent administrative offices. For matters specific to, say, Burleigh County or Cass County, the county auditor or commissioner's office is the correct point of contact.
4. Legal questions — nothing on this site constitutes legal advice, and inquiries of that nature belong with a licensed North Dakota attorney or a resource specifically scoped to legal information.

Service area covered

This office addresses informational questions about North Dakota as a state — its geography, governmental structure, communities, and public institutions. The scope runs from the Canadian border in the north (shared with Saskatchewan and Manitoba across 310 miles of border) to the South Dakota line, and from Minnesota on the east to Montana on the west.

That's a wide canvas. North Dakota's 53 counties range from Cass County — home to Fargo, the state's largest city with a population exceeding 125,000 according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates — to Slope County in the southwest, which ranks among the least densely populated counties in the entire United States. Questions touching any part of that range fall within the service area.

What falls outside: contractor licensing, plumbing codes, legal representation, federal agency matters, and tribal government affairs. Those each have dedicated resources or agencies better positioned to respond.

What to include in your message

A useful message contains four things, and a message with all four gets a faster, more precise response than one that doesn't.

Specificity of subject — "I have a question about North Dakota" is a starting point. "I have a question about how North Dakota's district courts relate to the Supreme Court" is actionable. The North Dakota Supreme Court and district courts pages on this site may already answer it, but if not, a specific framing helps route the inquiry correctly.

Geographic scope — State-level, county-level, and city-level questions often land with different sources. Naming the county or municipality — Ward County, Minot, the Bismarck-Mandan metro area — saves a round of clarifying questions.

Source or context — If a question stems from something read in a specific document, statute, or agency publication, naming that source narrows the search considerably.

Preferred format for response — Some questions are best answered with a direct paragraph; others benefit from a structured breakdown or a pointer to a specific page. Noting a preference is genuinely helpful.

Messages that arrive without a subject line, or that consist of a single sentence with no context, take longer to address — not because of any bureaucratic reluctance, but because North Dakota is a state with 53 counties, 4 major metro areas, a bicameral legislature meeting in Bismarck, and a governmental history stretching back to statehood on November 2, 1889. That's a lot of ground to cover without a compass heading.

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