The Detention Center
Washburn County Jail
- Operated byWashburn County Sheriff's Office
- Beds30-bed facility, constructed in 1991
- LocationSecond floor of the sheriff's office in Shell Lake, connected to the courthouse via a secure corridor
- Kitchen servicesSubcontracted through private companies
- Jail AdministratorGretchen Nielsen — Captain / Jail Administrator, overseeing approximately 19 jail employees
Source: Washburn County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-09-19
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 — not published
- ✗Independent inspection — not published
- ✓Who else it holds, and for how much
- ✗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 built1991
- Original costNot found
- Paid for byNot found
- Beds30
Since then
- Not found
The Sheriff
Sheriff Dennis Stuart
- Runs the jailThe Washburn County Sheriff's Office operates the county jail, located on the second floor of the sheriff's office and connected to the courthouse
- How the office is filledElected, four-year term, Wis. Stat. ch. 59
- Statutory basisWis. Stat. ch. 59 (county sheriff has custody of the county jail)
- Detention budget requested vs. approved, by year
- Jail staffing levels and vacancy rate
- Lawsuits and settlements involving the jail
Source: Washburn County Sheriff's Office · checked 2026-09-19
The Judges
Wisconsin circuit court judges are elected on a nonpartisan ballot to six-year terms under Wis. Const. art. VII — state judicial officers, not county officials.
Washburn 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 2026-09-19
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 boardNot found
- Where the jail money is decidedNot found
Notes on the record
- A 'Current Confinements' page exists at washburnsheriff.org/jail/current-confinements/ but returned an access error (HTTP 401) when opened, so it was not counted as a publicly viewable roster.
- The jail page states kitchen services are subcontracted through private companies, which is the only contract-related disclosure found on the site.
- State inspection/oversight: Wisconsin DOC Division of Community Corrections inspects county jails under Wis. Admin. Code DOC 350; applicability to Washburn County jail not independently confirmed on the sheriff's site.
These three offices decide who sits in a cell in Washburn 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 2026-09-19 · dollars and outcomes still being gathered