The Detention Center
Seneca County Jail
- Operated bySeneca County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address3040 S. State Route 100, Tiffin, OH 44883
- Rated capacity162 beds
- OpenedMay 1994 with 62 beds
- ExpansionFebruary 2007 — a 60-bed direct supervision unit and a 40-bed dormitory unit
- Staffing46 full-time corrections officers
- Jail AdministratorCaptain William J. Cunningham — Jail Administrator
Source: Seneca County Sheriff's Office — Corrections Division · checked 2026-09-20
Transparency rating
3/10Closed- ✓The jail is named
- ✗Who is in custody — not published
- ✓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 — not published
- ✗Phone, video and commissary rates — not published
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year built1994
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds162
Since then
- February 2007 — 60-bed direct supervision unit and 40-bed dormitory unit added to the original 62 beds
The Sheriff
Sheriff Fredrick W. Stevens
- Runs the jailYes — the sheriff's Corrections Division runs the Seneca County Jail
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term
- Office3040 S. State Route 100, Tiffin
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Seneca County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-09-20
The Judges
Ohio common pleas judges are elected to six-year terms; municipal and county court judges also set bail for people arrested in their areas. They are state judicial officers, not county officials.
Seneca 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 2026-09-20
The County Commissioners
They pay for the jail. The sheriff runs it.
- What they controlThe jail budget, the building itself, and the agreements that send prisoners to a regional jail or rent beds to other agencies. In Cuyahoga and Summit, the elected County Executive and County Council.
- What they don'tDay-to-day operations. The sheriff is separately elected and has charge of the county jail by state law (Ohio Rev. Code 341.01) — unless the county uses a regional jail run by a multicounty board.
- NoteBoard of County Commissioners, 111 Madison Street, Tiffin — members listed as Anthony Paradiso, Bill Frankart and Brent Busdeker in the county auditor's 2026 directory of elected officials. The county's main site (senecacountyohio.gov) is closed to our reader, so no agenda/minutes page could be opened.
- The boardSeneca County Board of County Commissioners →
- Where the jail money is decidedAgendas and minutes →
Notes on the record
- The sheriff's Corrections Division page is unusually full: jail name, address, bed count, opening year, the 2007 expansion, staffing, a downloadable PREA policy and inmate handbooks in English and Spanish.
- The inmate search the sheriff links is hosted on the City of Tiffin's domain (inmatelocator.tiffinohio.gov) and, when opened, did not identify the agency or show a readable in-custody list, so the roster check is no rather than yes.
- Commissary deposits (kiosk and JailATM) and video visitation through CIDNET are explained, but no fee rates are published, so the fees check is no.
- No bond or bail guidance, deaths-in-custody information, inspection report or contract appears on the sheriff's site.
- The county's general-government site senecacountyohio.gov returned 403 on every attempt, so the county budget could not be judged there. The county auditor's own site publishes annual financial reports; the 2023 report shows only a combined "Public safety" figure of $10,464,986, which its narrative says covers the sheriff among other offices, so it is not a sheriff or jail line and the budget check is no.
- What was tried and refused: senecacountyohio.gov and www.senecacountyohio.gov (403), www.co.seneca.oh.us (no such host).
- State inspection/oversight: Ohio's Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, through its Bureau of Adult Detention, inspects full-service county jails each year against the Minimum Standards for Jails in Ohio (Ohio Adm. Code 5120:1-8) and publishes the reports on its own website.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Seneca 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 2026-09-20 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered