Calhoun County and ICE: detention agreement, billing and daily jail counts

What the records show

A records note, dated Oct 18, 2026. Every finding below is labeled. The figures in the tiles and charts come from the cited pages or are computed from them. Confirmed by the record means the page says it. Working hypothesis means the records point that way but do not settle it. Page numbers refer to the PDFs below.

• Confirmed by the recordDaily population.

  The county's Finance Department accounting gives the number of ICE detainees in the jail for each of the 1,016 days from January 1, 2024 to October 12, 2026. The monthly average rose from 121 in January 2024 to 206 in September 2026. For each day, the local, boarder and total columns add up as printed.

  Daily population pp. 1 to 23; the county's October 14 response (item 3).

• Confirmed by the recordThe 2026 guaranteed minimum and rate (P00021).

  Modification P00021, issued by ICE as a "Mutual Agreement of Parties", raises the guaranteed minimum from 75 to 200 beds and the bed-day rate from $98.00 to $100.00, each "effective 1/1/2026." It reserves the line for 76 to 125 beds "for future use" and renames the top line "Over 200 Beds", with a unit price printed as $0.00 and no amount obligated. It also incorporates Department of Labor Wage Determination 2015-4835, Revision 31, dated December 3, 2025, and gives the period of performance as August 20, 2007 to August 19, 2027.

  P00021 states that both changes take effect January 1, 2026. The Sheriff signed it February 26, 2026. The county's copy leaves the ICE Contracting Officer's signature and date (blocks 16B and 16C) blank, and block 3 gives the modification's effective date as "See Block 16C". The county's copy of P00020 is blank in the same blocks (modifications p. 71), while ICE's public copy of P00020 carries the Contracting Officer's digital signature dated August 14, 2025, so this is consistent with a county file copy made before ICE signed. ICE's public library had not posted P00021 as of October 13, 2026; no record on this page shows the date ICE signed.

  P00021 pp. 1 to 3; modifications p. 71; ICE's posting of P00020 (linked below); the county's second October 14 message.

• Confirmed by the recordBilling against the daily counts.

  From October 2024 to December 2025, the bed-days in the county's billing history were within 3% of the county's daily counts each month.

  Under a guaranteed minimum, a term this agreement has used since 2013 (P00006), ICE pays for that many beds whether or not they are filled. For April, May and June 2026 the billing history records 6,000, 6,200 and 6,000 bed-days, which is 200 for each day of the month; the invoices for those months print a single amount with no day count or rate (invoices pp. 31 to 33). The county's daily counts for those months were 4,965, 5,045 and 4,982, below 200 on every day (highest 191). Billing for April to June matches the terms of P00021. The difference, 3,208 bed-days, comes to about $320,800 at $100 (an estimate from the billing history and the daily counts) for bed-days for which the county's counts show no ICE detainee. The billing history records each of these months as received in full (June 23, June 25 and August 27, 2026).

  In the other months of 2026 billing comes close to each day's count or 200, whichever is higher: within 14 bed-days in January (using the invoice's adjusted 6,381), February, March and July. August is the exception: every day's count was 200 or more, and billing was 61 below the count. From January to August 2026 the county's count was below 200 on 170 of 243 days.

  This site applies the 200-bed minimum day by day; P00021 does not say whether it is applied daily or monthly. For April to June 2026 the result is the same either way, since every day was below 200. The daily counts are the Finance Department's single figure for each day; billing conventions, such as how a day of arrival or release is counted, may account for small monthly differences; the records do not say.

  Billing history pp. 1 and 2; daily population pp. 17 to 22; invoices pp. 27, 31 to 33; P00021 pp. 2 and 3. Monthly figures are in the table under the second chart.

• Confirmed by the recordThe guaranteed minimum.

  A guaranteed minimum is the number of beds ICE pays for each day whether or not they are filled. Every modification before P00021 that states one sets it at 75: P00006 and P00007 (2013), P00009 (2019), P00012 (2020) and P00018 (2023). P00021 raises it to 200 from January 1, 2026. P00006 set tiers effective October 1, 2013: $72.00 a day for 1 to 75 detainees and $40 for 76 to 125; P00007 added $64.27 a day for 126 and above. P00006 also says: "If ICE requires additional beds beyond 125, Calhoun and ICE shall discuss meeting those requirements on a case by case basis" (p. 17); the released records do not show what, if anything, was agreed under that clause. P00013 added line items for 76 to 125 beds and for over 125 beds with a unit price printed as $0.00 and no amount obligated; from 2019 to 2023 the modifications state a bed-day rate only for the 75-bed line, and P00021 reserves the 76 to 125 line and renames the top line "Over 200 Beds"; and the invoices that print a rate apply one rate to every bed-day. The first, partial release withheld these figures as a jail security matter; the corrected set released them.

  Modifications pp. 17, 18, 21, 34, 52, 54, 65, 66; P00021 pp. 2 and 3; invoices pp. 13, 16, 27, 35; earlier partial release pp. 8, 11, 12, 14, 28, 30, 31 and its redaction log p. 33.

• Confirmed by the recordThe rate.

  $63.76 a day in the 2007 agreement, $63.16 weeks later (P00001), then $64.27 (P00003, 2008), the tiers of P00006 and P00007 (2013), $69.94 (P00009, from July 1, 2019), $74.66 (P00012, from July 1, 2020), $98.00 (P00018, from August 1, 2023) and $100.00 (P00021, from January 1, 2026). In the billing history each month's detention amount from February to August 2026 equals $100 times the bed-days, and the January and August 2026 invoices print $100.00 a day (invoices pp. 27, 35). The agreement's period of performance runs to August 19, 2027 (modifications p. 65; P00021 p. 2).

  The January 2026 invoice shows an original bill of $615,440 (which equals the billing history's 6,280 days at $98.00), adjusted by $22,660 to 6,381 days at $100 (invoices p. 27; billing history p. 2), consistent with P00021's January 1 effective date. The billing history records that bill, $649,676.47, as received May 8, 2026 (billing history p. 2).

  Agreement p. 1; modifications pp. 1, 10, 17, 21, 34, 52, 65; P00021 pp. 2 and 3; invoices pp. 27, 35; billing history p. 2.

• Confirmed by the recordPayment timing.

  By the county's billing history (date received) and its printed due dates, 11 of the 30 monthly invoices for January 2024 to July 2026 were received after the due date, by 4 to 135 days: October and November 2024 (18 and 11 days), June, July and September 2025 (9, 55 and 60), October, November and December 2025 (135, 114 and 77), January and February 2026 (44 each) and March 2026 (4). The invoices for October 2025 to January 2026 were all received May 8, 2026. One invoice covered March and April 2024 (invoices p. 3); the August 2026 invoice was not due until October 30, 2026 (invoices p. 35) and has no date received.

  On May 15, 2026 the Sheriff's Office issued four invoices to ICE for prompt-payment interest, $20,874.31 in total, on the October 2025 to January 2026 bills (invoices pp. 22, 24, 26, 28). The billing history lists them as "Other" and records all four as received May 18, 2026.

  Billing history pp. 1 and 2; invoices pp. 1 to 35. Due dates are the county's, usually 30 days from the invoice date (net 30 terms, modifications p. 65; two invoices, pp. 11 and 25, print later due dates). The records do not show when ICE received each invoice, so this does not establish lateness under federal payment rules. The records do not say why payments were late, or whether the county demanded this interest or recorded interest ICE paid on its own.

• Confirmed by the recordThe 287(g) agreement.

  Signed by the Sheriff on April 7, 2025 and by ICE on May 6, 2025. It covers serving ICE warrants on people already in the jail, at their scheduled release.

  In its October 14, 2026 response the county stated that no Sheriff's Office staff have been trained as Warrant Service Officers "and thus no activity has taken place under the 287(g) agreement." The released records contain nothing that tests that statement either way.

  287(g) agreement pp. 1, 7 to 8; the county's October 14 response (item 4).

• Confirmed by the recordThe Board of Commissioners.

  This site read the minutes of five Board meetings, December 4, 2025 to February 19, 2026. They record no motion on the ICE agreement, the 287(g) agreement or a detention rate; members of the public raised ICE during public comment at each of them. Minutes of earlier meetings since January 2024 were not reviewed for this note.

  The Sheriff signed P00021 for the county, as the Sheriff signed earlier rate modifications since 2007 (modifications pp. 1, 9, 16, 20, 33, 49; P00021 p. 1). In its second October 14, 2026 message the county wrote: "There were no agenda items before the Board of Commissioners between 1/1/24 and 10/12/26," and certified "that the public record does not exist." Nothing shows a Board vote was required, or that one was skipped.

  The county's second October 14 message (item 5). Minutes on the county's public meeting portal, Citizens' Time and motions: December 4, 2025, December 18, 2025, January 15, 2026, February 5, 2026, February 19, 2026.

What the records do not show

• Why 2026 billing differs from the guarantee in some months. P00021 accounts for April to June. It does not account for January's billing-history figure (6,280, below the 6,367 that the 200-bed minimum gives; the invoice's adjusted 6,381 is close to it) or for August, billed 61 bed-days below the county's count. The counts on this page are the Finance Department's; the county says the Sheriff's Office also "maintains and transmits a daily record of individuals housed in ICE custody," which was not released and could be the basis for billing, and the agreement calls for invoices supported by each detainee's check-in and check-out dates (modifications p. 18).
• Who approved the rate changes. The 2023 change (P00018) and P00019 were issued by ICE on forms whose box marking the county as not required to sign is checked, and carry no county signature (modifications pp. 64, 69). The Sheriff signed P00020 in August 2025 (p. 71) and P00021 in February 2026 (P00021 p. 1); the county's copy of P00021 does not carry ICE's signature. Earlier rate changes (P00001, P00003, P00006, P00007, P00009 and P00012, the 2020 change issued "in accordance with the agreement") carry the Sheriff's signature (pp. 1, 9, 16, 20, 33, 49); some earlier non-rate modifications, such as P00004 and P00013, were also issued without a county signature (pp. 11, 53). P00019 removed the "Transgender Care" requirements added by P00015 Attachment 2, and P00020 adopted the 2025 National Detention Standards (pp. 70, 72). The agreement makes ICE responsible for reviewing and approving costs (agreement p. 1). Nothing shows a Board vote was required, or that one was skipped.
• Small differences between the county's own records. For January 2026 the billing history prints 6,280 bed-days but $638,100, which is the invoice's adjusted 6,381 days at $100. For August 2026 the invoice bills 6,442 days, the billing history 6,405, and the daily counts sum to 6,466; the two billing records differ by $3,700. The December 2024 detention amount, $390,922.00, repeats November's, although the billing history gives 4,090 bed-days for December and 3,989 for November. For October 2024 it gives 4,285 bed-days and $416,892.00, which is 4,254 days at $98. The August 2026 row shows a received total with no date received; that invoice, dated September 30, 2026, was due October 30, 2026 (invoices p. 35). These are listed so readers can check them; the records do not explain them.
• Any wrongdoing by anyone. Nothing on these pages shows that the county, the Sheriff's Office or ICE broke a law, rule or contract term. Late payments, billing in some months that differs slightly from the daily counts, and the differences between records each have ordinary explanations these records do not rule out. They are listed because they are what a reader would ask about next.
• Records the agreement calls for on virtual attorney visits. P00015 (signed by the Sheriff May 3, 2023) added Attachment 1, Virtual Attorney Visitation, and Attachment 2, Transgender Care; P00019 (signed by ICE February 25, 2025) rescinded the Attachment 2 requirements (modifications pp. 58, 69 to 70). Attachment 1 requires written procedures for scheduling virtual attorney visits and exchanging messages and documents, sent to ICE for posting on the facility's ICE.gov page, and a monthly usage log sent to ICE; a facility that cannot implement virtual visitation may seek a one-year waiver through ICE (Attachment 1 pp. 1 and 2). These records were not requested and are not in this release.