The Detention Center
Ottawa County Jail
- Operated byOttawa County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address12130 Fillmore Street, West Olive, MI 49460
- Sheriff's administrative office12220 Fillmore Street, West Olive, MI 49460
- PREA policySite states a 'zero tolerance policy toward all forms of sexual abuse and sexual harassment,' citing the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) 2003
- Bond typesSite explains cash bonds, 10% bonds, and surety bonds, and how each is processed
Source: Ottawa County website · checked 2026-09-19
Transparency rating
5/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✗Beds and daily population — not published
- ✓What it costs taxpayers
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✓PREA audits
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✗Who else it holds, and for how much — not published
- ✓How to post bond
- ✗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 Eric J. DeBoer
- Runs the jailOttawa County Sheriff's Office Corrections Division operates the county jail
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term, MCL 51.70
- Statutory basisMCL 51.75 gives the sheriff custody of the county jail
- UndersheriffDavid J. Kok
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Ottawa County website · checked 2026-09-19
The Judges
Michigan circuit and district court judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms under Mich. Const. art. VI — state judicial officers, not county officials.
Ottawa County Circuit Court
- Not found
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-19
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 boardJim Barry (D1), Jordan Jorritsma (D2), Doug R. Zylstra (D3), Jacob Bonnema (D4), Joe Moss (D5), Kendra Wenzel (D6), John Teeples (D7), Sylvia Rhodea (D8), Phil Kuyers (D9, Vice-Chair), Josh Brugger (D10, Chair), Allison Miedema (D11) →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- app.miottawa.org/InmateLookup/ is a live search tool on the county's own subdomain for current in-custody inmates by last name (not a static published list), which was counted as satisfying the roster check.
- Jail page (miottawa.org/sheriff/jail/) publishes a detailed PREA zero-tolerance policy statement and reporting channels (Silent Observer tip line, dedicated jail-crime-tips email and phone lines).
- Commissary/bond page explains cash, 10%, and surety bond mechanics in detail and notes that commissary deposits are 'subject to transaction fees,' though no specific fee amounts are itemized on the page.
- County publishes FY26 and prior-year (2022-2024) approved budget PDFs and an OpenGov interactive budget viewer via fiscal-services/budget/, but sheriff/jail-specific line-item breakouts were not confirmed within the page text reviewed.
- No capacity/bed count, inspection records, vendor contracts, or deaths-in-custody information were found on the county's own domain.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Ottawa 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 2026-09-19 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered