The Detention Center
Whitman County Jail
- Operated byWhitman County Sheriff's Office
- Jail address411 N Mill Street, Colfax, WA 99111 — the same building as the Sheriff's Office
- Year built1984 (county Jail Statistics page and the Sheriff's Office inmate-listing site)
- Published capacity62 beds: 28 maximum security, 16 male work release, 4 female work release, 2 special housing
- Published daily populationApproximately 32 to 38 on most days, swelling past 50 several times a year (county Jail Statistics page)
- State returnADP 28.75, 62 beds, 787 admissions, average length of stay 29.3 days, no in-custody deaths (WASPC 2025)
- Out-of-county commitment rate$50 a day, cash, brought with the person on the arranged date, for someone a judge has allowed to serve time here
- Original cost / funding / expansionsNot found — checked the County Jail page and all fourteen of its sub-pages, the Sheriff page, the Annual Budget page and the inmate-listing site
Source: Whitman County — County Jail · checked 2026-08-23
Transparency rating
5/10Partial- ✓The jail is named
- ✓Who is in custody
- ✓Beds and daily population
- ✓What it costs taxpayers
- ✗Deaths in custody — not published
- ✗PREA audits — not published
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✗Who else it holds, and for how much — not published
- ✓How to post bond
- ✗Phone, video and commissary rates — not published
The Building
You paid for it. Here is what the record says it cost.
- Year built1984
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds62 (28 maximum security, 16 male work release, 4 female work release, 2 special housing), with temporary bunks available
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Brett Myers
- Runs the jailYes — the Jail Facility is listed among the Sheriff's Office responsibilities; Whitman County has no separate department of corrections
- How the office is filledElected countywide
- Office411 N Mill Street, Colfax, WA 99111 — 509-397-6266; jail line 509-397-5585
- Named jail commanderNot found — the county names no corrections chief on the Sheriff or County Jail pages
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Whitman County — Sheriff · checked 2026-08-23
The Judges
Washington Superior Court judges are elected in nonpartisan countywide races and District Court judges in nonpartisan district races. Both are state judicial officers, not county officials. A judge sets the bail and the cash bail alternative; the jail only takes the money. The Administrative Office of the Courts' directory names no presiding judge for Whitman County.
Whitman County Superior Court
- Roger Sandberg
Colfax Municipal Court
- Lindsi Alcantar
- The county's bond schedule
- Share of the jail population held pretrial
- Median time from booking to first appearance
Source: the state judiciary · checked 2026-08-23
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
- Whitman County is unusually forthcoming for a small jail: it publishes bed counts by housing type, a plain statement of typical daily population, a virtual jail tour, and step-by-step bail instructions including the warning that 'there is no such thing as 10%' when bailing directly at the jail.
- roster: the Sheriff's Office runs whitmancountyjail.org, which lists everyone currently held with charges and bail amounts and states it is updated about every ten minutes under RCW 70.48.100.
- contracts: marked no. The $50-a-day out-of-county commit rate is a fee charged to an individual serving another court's sentence here, not an agreement with another agency.
- fees: the Commissary page explains how money reaches an account (jail lobby cash or card, or the Inmate Canteen website) but publishes no commissary, phone or video-visit prices.
- budget: the county posts annual budgets for 2022 through 2026 through its Annual Budget page.
- WASPC 2025 statewide jail statistics for the Whitman County Sheriff's Office: ALOS 29.3 days, ADP 28.75, 62 beds, 787 admissions, in-custody deaths 'No' (https://www.waspc.org/annual-jail-statistics).
- Three commissioners elected by district: Art Swannack (District 1), Tom Handy (District 2), Chad Whetzel (District 3), with Corey Mitzimberg as Clerk of the Board, at 400 N Main Street, Colfax. No jail district and no dedicated jail tax is published by the county.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Whitman 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.
The county auditor runs the election in Whitman County and prints the ballot the sheriff’s name is on. Links from USA.gov and vote.gov.
Names verified 2026-08-23 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered