The Detention Center
Not scored. The county's own website was not reachable in the session that produced this record, so its disclosures were never examined. This is a gap in the research, not a finding about the county.
- Operated byPine County Sheriff's Office
- Licensed capacity131 beds (secure coed) per the 03/30/2026 DOC inspection report
- License classLocal Adult Detention Facility (Minn. Rules ch. 2911)
- On-site jail administrator named in the DOC reportRodney Williamson
- Population on day of inspectionNot stated in the extracted report content
- What was triedco.pine.mn.us (the URL published on the state and county-association portals) redirects every path to pinecountymn.gov; WebFetch could not render either the original redirect target's content or any further path on pinecountymn.gov or co.pine.mn.us — every attempt after the first returned PROVENANCE_REQUIRED and was not resolved. No actual Pine County page content (beyond the bare fact that it redirects) was obtained this session.
Source: MN DOC — Pine County Detention Center Facility Inspection Report (03/30/2026) · checked 2026-09-18
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year builtNot found
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds131 (per MN DOC 03/30/2026 inspection report)
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Jeff Nelson
- Runs the jailYes — the Pine County Detention Center. The elected sheriff has charge and custody of the county jail under Minn. Stat. 387.11 and is responsible for its operation and condition under Minn. Stat. 641.14 (MN state layer)
- How the office is filledElected countywide to a four-year term under Minn. Stat. 382.01 (MN state layer)
- Named inMN DOC Pine County Detention Center inspection report dated 03/30/2026
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: MN DOC — Pine County Detention Center Facility Inspection Report (03/30/2026) · 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.
Minnesota District Court (judicial district covering Pine County)
- 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 2026-09-18
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
- Genuinely could not open Pine County's own site this session. co.pine.mn.us (the state-portal/county-association-listed URL) 302-redirects to pinecountymn.gov; every WebFetch of that redirect target, and every further attempt at co.pine.mn.us itself, returned PROVENANCE_REQUIRED and was never approved, even on repeated retries. Per the brief, audit.checks is left empty rather than scored as ten 'no' answers, because the site was never actually examined — only its existence and its redirect target were confirmed.
- All jail facts here come from the state DOC inspection report, which cannot itself satisfy any transparency check, including 'inspections'.
- Not found — Pine County's own site could not be rendered within this session (see audit.notes). Minnesota counties are generally governed by an elected Board of County Commissioners.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Pine 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