The Detention Center
None — Perkins County has no county jail
- Operated byN/A
- Where prisoners are heldKeith County Jail and Lincoln County Jail — Sheriff Jeffrey Miller reported to the Board of Commissioners on January 5, 2026 that he was 'holding one inmate each at the Keith County Jail and the Lincoln County Jail'
- Confirms no in-county jailPerkins County does not appear as a reporting jail facility in the Nebraska Crime Commission's jail-data reporting table, consistent with the sheriff's report
Source: Perkins County Board of Commissioners — January 5, 2026 minutes · checked 2026-08-25
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 Jeffrey Miller
- Office address200 Lincoln Ave, Grant, NE 69140 (mail: PO Box 607)
- Runs a jailNo — reported to the county board that Perkins County has no jail of its own; inmates are held under contract in other counties
- How the office is filledElected on a partisan ballot, four-year term (Neb. Rev. Stat. 32-520)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Perkins County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-08-25
The Judges
Nebraska's trial courts (District Court and County Court) are state judicial officers, not county officials. All Nebraska judges are merit-selected: the Governor appoints from a judicial nominating commission list, then face retention elections (Neb. Const. Art. V, section 21). No Perkins County Court judge name was confirmed from a page reached in this research.
- 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
- No jail — this is not a gap. Perkins County contracts to hold its inmates at the Keith County Jail and the Lincoln County Jail, per the sheriff's own report to the county board, published in the board's own minutes.
- 'budget' checked yes because the same published minutes itemize county payroll and claims (approximately $178,000+ across departments including roads, fair, transit and ambulance); this is board-meeting spending detail rather than a formal budget document.
- 'contracts' checked yes on the strength of the sheriff's report naming the two out-of-county jails holding Perkins County inmates, published in the county's own minutes; no dollar rate was stated.
- Public records requests must be answered within 4 business days (Neb. Rev. Stat. 84-712).
- Board of Commissioners, confirmed by name in the county's own January 5, 2026 minutes ('the Perkins County, Nebraska, Board of Commissioners'). Commissioners present at that meeting: Steve Tucker and Mark Bottom; the full membership roster was not independently confirmed.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Perkins 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