Although their powers were, in most cases, quite limited, the local police services of individual towns and cities supplemented the work of the National Police Corps, dealing with such matters as traffic, parking, monitoring public demonstrations, guarding municipal buildings, and enforcing local ordinancÍÍÍÍes. They also collaborated with the National Police Corps by providing personnel to assist in crowd control. Numbering about 37,000 individuals in 1986, the local police were generally armed only with pistols.

Under the Statutes of Autonomy of 1979, the Basque Country and Catalonia were granted authority to form their own regional police forces. Subsequently, ten of the seventeen autonomous regions were extended the right to create their own forces, but, as of 1988, only three areas--the Basque Country, Catalonia, and Navarre--had developed regional police units. The 1986 organic law defined the limits of competence for regional police forces, although the restrictions imposed did not apply to the existing forces in the Basque Country and Navarre and applied only in part to those in Catalonia. Under the law, regional police could enforce regional legislation, protect regional offices, and, in cooperation with national forces, could police public places, control demonstrations and crowds, and perform duties in support of the judiciary. A Security Policy Council was established at the national level to ensure proper coordination with the new regional forces, which, as of 1986, numbered about 4,500 officers.

Data as of December 1988