The Detention Center
Hall County Department of Corrections
- Operated byHall County Department of Corrections (county board of corrections, not the Sheriff's Office)
- Who runs itTodd Bahensky — Director, Hall County Department of Corrections
- Answers tothe Hall County Board of Corrections
- Why this is differentThe elected county sheriff does not run this jail.
- Address110 Public Safety Drive, Grand Island, NE 68801
- Year builtConstructed in 2008, per the county's own Inmate/Detainee Handbook
- Layout10 housing units (dormitory, double-occupancy and single-cell configurations), each with a common dayroom, phones, showers, and adjacent multi-purpose/recreation space
- Designed capacity321 beds, per the county-hosted 2024 PREA audit report; average daily population over the prior 12 months was 267, and the facility had not exceeded capacity in that period
- PREA auditMarch 1–2, 2024 audit found the facility met all 45 applicable PREA standards, 0 exceeded, 0 not met, with one minor corrective action (policy language on termination for hiring-disclosure omissions) noted as completed
- 150,000-population thresholdNeb. Rev. Stat. 23-2802 makes a county board of corrections mandatory only at 150,000 or more inhabitants and optional below that. Hall County's population is approximately 63,633 (U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts, 2025 estimate) — well under that threshold — so Hall County's corrections-department structure was adopted by county choice, not because the county meets the mandatory-threshold population.
- Bond typesCash bond (full amount in cash), surety bond (via licensed bondsman, typically 10% fee), 10% cash bond, and personal/O.R. bond
- Phone feesLocal calls $2.25 plus long-distance charges; daily/weekly/monthly caps of $35/day, $100 per 7-day period, $200 per 30-day period
- Video visitationOn-site visits free (45 minutes, up to twice weekly); at-home visits carry a "small fee"; all video visits are monitored and recorded
- CommissaryOrdered via kiosk; indigent commissary distribution Wednesday through Friday
Source: Hall County, NE — Corrections · checked 2026-08-25
Transparency rating
6/10Partial- ✓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 — not published
- ✓How to post bond
- ✓Phone, video and commissary rates
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year built2008
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds321 (designed capacity, per the 2024 PREA audit)
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Josh Berlie
- Runs the jailNo — a separate Hall County Department of Corrections runs the jail. The county's Board of Commissioners "Functions" page states directly: "In Hall County, The Department of Corrections supervises the county jail." The Sheriff's Office handles law enforcement and civil functions (accident/incident reports, warrants, civil process, sheriff's sales) but not jail operations.
- How the office is filledElected countywide, four-year term (Neb. Rev. Stat. 32-520); described on the county site as the "33rd Sheriff of Hall County"
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Hall County, NE — Sheriff · checked 2026-08-25
The Judges
Nebraska judges are merit-selected and are state, not county, officials: the Governor appoints from a judicial nominating commission's list, and the appointee then faces an uncontested retention vote (Neb. Const. Art. V § 21). Hall County's own Courts page lists three County Court judges (Goding, Corey, McQuay) with offices in Grand Island, and lists District Court judges Jorgensen and Rademacher under a "Buffalo County District Court" heading with a Kearney, NE office — indicating Hall shares a judicial district with Buffalo County, though the exact district number was not confirmed from a source opened this session.
District Court
- Gerald R. Jorgensen, Jr.
- John Rademacher
County Court
- Stacie A. Goding
- Al Corey
- Bryan S. McQuay
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-25
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
- Hall County is one of the counties the Nebraska Crime Commission's own jail-data reporting list shows as a 'CORRECTIONS' department rather than a sheriff's office (per plains_states.json's NE state-layer finding, corroborated this session by the county's own site, which names a Hall County Department of Corrections separate from the Sheriff's Office and states plainly that Corrections 'supervises the county jail').
- Population check: Hall County's population (~63,633, 2025 Census estimate) is far below the 150,000-inhabitant threshold that makes a county board of corrections mandatory under Neb. Rev. Stat. 23-2802, so Hall County's corrections-department structure is a choice the county made, not a statutory requirement triggered by population.
- The general county budget is published as PDFs and audit reports (imaging.hallcountyne.gov), but a Corrections-specific budget line item was not located and opened, so 'budget' is marked no rather than assumed.
- State-layer finding applies: Neb. Rev. Stat. 83-4,131 requires the Jail Standards Board's inspection report to go to the facility's governing body, not to the public; no state agency publishes it, and Hall County's own site does not publish a Jail Standards Board inspection report either (the county does publish a 2024 PREA audit report, which is a different, federal-standard, audit and is recorded separately under 'prea').
- Board of Commissioners, seven members elected by district: Butch Hurst (District 1), Karen Bredthauer (District 2), Scott Sorensen (District 3, Vice Chair), Pamela E. Lancaster (District 4), Jane Richardson (District 5), Gary Quandt (District 6), and Ron Peterson (District 7, Chair). Note: the 2008 Nebraska Blue Book's township-county list (in plains_states.json) places Hall County among the 27 seven-member "Board of Supervisors" counties, but Hall County's own current site names its body the "Board of Commissioners" while retaining the seven-member, district-elected structure — a discrepancy with the 2008 source that this session flags rather than resolves.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Hall 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 2026-08-25 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered