Our Mission to provide opportunities for a safer community by providing the clients we serve with the resources necessary to be successful in the communities they reside. The First Judicial District Department of Correctional Services is here to provide a comprehensive program of community correctional services, including: Pre-Trial Services, Presentence Investigations, Probation Supervision, Resi
dential Correctional Facilities, Work Release, Parole, Compact Services and Special Programs. We serve eleven counties in Northeast Iowa which include: Allamakee, Black Hawk, Buchanan, Chickasaw, Clayton, Delaware, Dubuque, Fayette, Grundy, Howard and Winneshiek. The First Judicial District Department of Correctional Services is an agency established under Iowa Code Chapter 905 to provide correctional services throughout the eleven counties of Northeast Iowa, which comprise the First Judicial District. In October of 1973, the first efforts at establishing community-based corrections in the First Judicial District Department of Correctional Services revolved around a Waterloo based agency established to provide correctional services in Black Hawk, Grundy, and Buchanan Counties, named the “Tri-County Department of Court Services.”
In late 1974, a similar office was established in Oelwein to provide correctional services in Fayette, Chickasaw, Clayton, Howard, Winneshiek, and Allamakee Counties. In November of 1976, the two agencies were merged into one to provide most of the basic pre-institutional services in nine of the eleven counties of the district and a limited level of service in Dubuque and Delaware Counties. In 1977, all eleven counties merged into one agency called, “The First Judicial District Department of Correctional Services.”
Early efforts to establish a residential facility/probation office in the Waterloo-Cedar Falls area finally paid off in late 1976 with the establishment of a residential facility in the old Ellis Hotel building in downtown Waterloo. In November of 1981, Waterloo probation staff separated from the residential setting and moved from the Ellis Hotel to the current Waterloo Probation/Parole office at 527 E. 5th Street. In 1984, a 36-bed facility was built in Dubuque on Elm Street; and in 1985, the Waterloo Residential Facility moved from the condemned Ellis Hotel to a newly constructed 56-bed facility at 310 East 6th Street. On July 1, 1984, the State Department of Corrections turned over the administration of all community-based correctional services to the eight judicial districts, bringing on Parole, Compact Services, and Work Release for those inmates released from prison. The Work Release Facility in Waterloo had been in operation since November of 1971. In March of 1991 an addition was completed to the Waterloo Residential Facility to house Work Release and Administrative Offices. In this transition Work Release expanded from a 20-bed facility to a 64-bed multi-program facility. In 1992 a 32-bed multi-program correctional facility was completed in West Union. In 1995 an 8-bed expansion was built creating a 40-bed co-correctional facility. In early 2001, a 44-bed expansion of the Dubuque Residential Facility was completed bringing the total design capacity to 80 beds. In 2011 a 45 bed Women’s Center for Change was constructed and the Probation/Parole offices were opened in July.
