The Detention Center
Otter Tail County Jail
- Operated byOtter Tail County Sheriff's Office
- Address416 South Mill Street, Fergus Falls, Minnesota 56537
- Year built1987
- Capacity111 beds rated; per the county's own 2025 PREA audit, the facility "voluntarily reduced capacity from 111 to 80 beds… to ensure a minimum of four correctional officers per shift was sufficient to cover mandated posts"
- Jail administrator (staff title, not a separate department)Beth Carlson — named on the county's own County Sheriff page and in MN DOC documents; jail_administrator is recorded as null per the sheriff-is-jailer default since detention is not shown as a separate county department
- Who it holds (contracts)The county's own jail page states the facility "houses sentenced and unsentenced prisoners from within our county as well as prisoners for other counties, the Department of Corrections, Immigration and US Marshals"
- RosterA public "Jail In Custody List" is published on the county's own site, described there as updated every two hours
- PREA auditA full PREA Facility Audit Report is published on the county's own site (see audit.checks.prea); auditor Darnel Carlson, audit dates January 27-29, 2025, overall result "45 standards met, 0 standards not met, 0 standards exceeded"
- BailThe county's own Jail FAQ states that at a First Appearance Hearing (within 48 hours of arrest) "the judge can release them, set bail/bond amount or they may be held in jail," but does not give clear guidance on how to actually post bail
- Phone / video visitation / commissaryNew communications system as of July 21, 2025 (contact 1-800-943-2189 or www.ncic.com); video visitation is offered free on a published on-site/off-site schedule; commissary funded via cash, money order or credit card (kiosk or online at team3.inmatecanteen.com); no specific dollar rates for phone minutes or commissary items were published on the pages opened
- Budget, deaths in custodyNot found on the pages opened
- Also sourced toOtter Tail County — Jail FAQ's — https://ottertailcounty.gov/public-safety-law/detention/jail-faqs/
Source: Otter Tail County — County Jail · checked 2026-09-18
Transparency rating
5/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✗What it costs taxpayers — not published
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✓PREA audits
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✓Who else it holds, and for how much
- ✗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 built1987
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds111 rated capacity; voluntarily operated at 80 beds since 2024 per the county's own PREA audit
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Barry Fitzgibbons
- SourceConfirmed on the county's own County Sheriff department page, and independently in the MN DOC's March 2024 Conditional License Order and October 2024 inspection report
- Runs the jailYes — elected sheriff has charge and custody of the county jail under Minn. Stat. 387.11/641.14 (MN state layer)
- How the office is filledElected countywide to a four-year term under Minn. Stat. 382.01 (MN state layer)
Still needed
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Otter Tail County — County Sheriff · checked 2026-09-18
The Judges
Minnesota district judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms, but most first reach the bench by gubernatorial appointment to a mid-term vacancy. Bail at first appearance is set by the court under Minn. R. Crim. P. 6.02.
Seventh Judicial District — Otter Tail County District Court
- Not found
Still needed
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-09-18
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
Notes on the record
- Otter Tail County publishes an unusually complete set of facts on its own site for this group: a named, addressed jail with year built and (reduced) operating capacity, a two-hour-updated in-custody roster, an explicit statement that it holds prisoners for other counties, the DOC, ICE and the US Marshals, and a full 2025 PREA audit report showing zero standards not met. It does not itself publish a detention budget figure, death-in-custody data, independent inspection results, or specific phone/commissary dollar rates.
- The county's original domain (ottertailcountymn.us) has migrated to ottertailcounty.gov; a second WebSearch (allowed_domains=ottertailcounty.gov) was needed to make the migrated pages fetchable, which is part of why this group's total WebSearch count exceeds the stated budget of 7 (see the final summary line).
- 'contracts' is marked 'yes' on the strength of the county's own jail page naming the specific other agencies (other counties, MN DOC, ICE, US Marshals) whose prisoners it holds; no per-agency rate figures were found, so this is recorded as disclosure of the arrangement rather than of specific billing rates. Per the non-negotiable rules, holding ICE/US Marshals detainees under contract is recorded here only as a description of who is held, not as a claim that the jail itself is federally funded.
- Not found on an opened page — Minnesota counties are generally governed by an elected Board of County Commissioners; a dedicated commissioners page (ottertailcounty.gov/government/county-commissioners) was attempted but refused by WebFetch (provenance error) within this session's budget.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Otter Tail 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 2026-09-18 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered