The article examines legal, organizational, socioeconomic aspects of the local government efficiency, analyzes a number of objective and subjective indicators of the efficiency assessment, researches the registry of municipal programs, and studies the process of development and transformation of the municipality statute and other municipal legal acts in accordance with the federal and regional changes in legislation. The analysis of archival documents, various information materials, and legal acts regulating the activity of the local government in the municipality, in particular, the urban district of the city of Barnaul of Altai Region, the study of theoretical sources and points of view of some experts in the field of state and municipal government allow the authors to study the formation and development of the local government in the urban district from the beginning of the phased constitutional reform (October 2003) to the present. More than 20 years of practical experience of one of the authors in the municipal authorities allows assessing the events from the objective point of view and with the use of the subjective analysis method. The article investigates structural changes of the local governments in Barnaul in the course of municipal reform in Russia. The authors carried out a comparative analysis of the efficiency of the municipal authorities to address the urgent issues of local life in different periods, stressed the need for public participation in the management area, the importance of preserving historical and other local traditions in matters of socio-economic development of the city and the importance of continuity in the evolution of the legal and institutional foundations of the local government.