My "county" is Bezirk Imst ("Imst district") in the Austrian federal state of Tirol.
Its county seat is the city of Imst, with approx. 10'000 inhabitants, and it has about 20 municipalities with populations from 1'000-5'000. Located in a very mountainous region, the district spans a part of the main valley of Tirol, the Inntal valley (after the river 'Inn'); as well as three of his tributary rivers, the Ötztal, Pitztal and Gurgltal valleys ("Tal" means valley in German, in case you didn't notice
) and a high-plateau, the Mieminger Plateau. The district has an area of about 2'000 sqkm (700 sqmls) and a population of about 60'000.
The district is a very touristy area, especially in the tributary valleys; and there is only little industry, mainly in Imst. There are still quite a few people living at smaller farms, together with having another job, eg in the tourism branch; but there is a tendency of either specialising (mainly producing fruits or vegetables, the climate is too cold to produce crops in large numbers) and producing this product on a large scale, or giving up ones farm. The service sector outside of the tourism branch is underdeveloped, and many people commute to the nearby capital of Tirol, Innsbruck, which is from 20 minutes to 40 minutes along the Inntal valley away. People in the tributary valleys however nearly exclusively work in the tourism sector, mainly with owning hotels or pensions themselves (the staff usually is from Eastern Germany or Eastern Europe), but also in all fields somehow related with tourism; including shops, restaurants but also law and accounting fields (my mum works in a accounting firm, and up to 70% of their clients are pensions or hotels or shops or whatever in tourism villages). The tourism sector itself is based on ski-tourism in the winter and hiking in the summer, so between the seasons, nothing is going on in the tourism villages.
Politically, the district is as "black" (the color associated with the main conservative party in Austria, the ÖVP) as can be, the ÖVP regularly scores one of their best results in the district. In the 2013 election, just a single municipality (the one I live in - Rietz) did not vote for the ÖVP. However, the dominance of the ÖVP is at retreat. While they scored Mississippi-like results in the First Republic (1919-1933/38) and still 60+ results throughout much of the 50ies, 60ies and 70ies; they have now been reduced to 37% in the federal election of 2013 (compared to 32% in Tirol and 24% in Austria) . Their gap has been largely filled by the FPÖ, even though the district has comparably a low share of immigrants (season workers don't count, as they don't live here), and to some extent also by Greens and NEOS, but still, they are weak as the district is very rural.
