The Detention Center
Montgomery County Jail / Department of Corrections
- Operated byMontgomery County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address300 E. Main Street, Judicial Center (1st Floor), Independence, KS 67301
- Phone620-330-1240
- Fax620-330-1119
- HoursMonday–Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
- Online jail page is login-gatedThe county's '/162/County-Jail' page redirects to a CivicPlus authentication login screen rather than showing public content
- What was triedhttps://www.mgcountyks.org/m/directory/department?did=11 (opened); https://www.mgcountyks.org/283/Office-Locator (opened); https://www.mgcountyks.org/278/Adult-Community-Corrections (opened — describes diversion/probation programs, not the jail); https://www.mgcountyks.org/162/County-Jail (redirected to a CivicPlus login page); https://www.mgcountyks.org/165/Agendas-Minutes (opened — links to BOCC agendas/minutes; no jail-specific budget document was examined); https://www.mgcountyks.org/185/Court-Services (opened — no bond/bail information published)
Source: Montgomery County, KS — Jail / Department of Corrections directory page · checked 2026-09-17
Transparency rating
1/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✗Who is in custody — not published
- ✗Beds and daily population — not published
- ✗What it costs taxpayers — not published
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✗PREA audits — not published
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✗Who else it holds, and for how much — not published
- ✗How to post bond — not published
- ✗Phone, video and commissary rates — not published
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- BedsNot found
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Ron Wade
- TitleMontgomery County Sheriff
- Office address300 East Main, Independence, KS 67301
- Phone620-330-1000
- Fax620-330-1686
- UndersheriffChristopher V. Williams
- Statutory jail dutyK.S.A. 19-811 makes the elected sheriff the charge and custody officer of the county jail and all prisoners in it
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Montgomery County, KS — Sheriff's Office staff directory · checked 2026-09-17
The Judges
Kansas decides judicial selection district by district under Kan. Const. Art. 3 §6 and K.S.A. 20-2901. In most rural Kansas counties the district magistrate judge sets bail (K.S.A. 20-302b). The 14th Judicial District elects its district judges on a partisan ballot - the default under Kan. Const. Art. 3 sec. 6. Its voters have not adopted the nonpartisan nominating-commission method available under K.S.A. 20-2901.
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-17
The County Commissioners
They pay for the jail. The sheriff runs it.
- What they controlThe detention budget, the building itself, and the agreements that let other agencies rent its beds.
- What they don'tDay-to-day operations. The sheriff is separately elected and answers to voters, not to the board.
- The boardBoard of County Commissioners →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- Montgomery County names its jail/Department of Corrections and gives its address, phone and hours on its own site, but a page titled 'County Jail' (/162/County-Jail) redirects to a CivicPlus login screen rather than public content, so whatever it holds (possibly a roster or other detail) could not be examined. No published capacity, budget, death, PREA, inspection, contract, bond, or fee information was found on the pages that were open to the public.
- K.S.A. 75-5228, the 1973 jail inspection statute, was repealed effective 11 April 1996; the companion statute, K.S.A. 75-5227, was repealed effective 1 July 1996. Nothing replaced them, and the Kansas Department of Corrections runs no county-jail inspection program.
- Board of County Commissioners; agendas and minutes are posted under the county's 'Agendas & Minutes' page, with meetings scheduled through the county calendar (e.g., September 21 and 28, 2026). General county government page also on file.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Montgomery County and what it costs the people who live here. Nationally, almost 77% of the people who died in local jails in 2019 had not been convicted of anything, and suicide was the leading single cause of those deaths (Bureau of Justice Statistics, Mortality in Local Jails, 2000–2019).
How much is your sheriff — and your judge — costing you?
Your VOTE is POWERFUL.
The sheriff who runs this jail is elected. So are the commissioners who pay for it.
Names verified 2026-09-17 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered