Milwaukee County’s goal is to enrich your life by providing essential services that meet your needs and those of your family, neighbors, co-workers and friends.
We enhance the quality of life in Milwaukee County through great public service.
Milwaukee County is home to over 950,000 people living in one of 19 communities, which range in size from the City of Milwaukee, with 595,000 residents, to the Village of River Hills, with roughly 1,600 residents.
Still a manufacturing stronghold, the region features 16 Fortune 1000 companies and thousands of others in the financial services, medical device, hospitality and retailing industries.
Find information about things to do and happenings in Milwaukee County.
Get help with COVID-19: Apply for rent or mortgage assistance and learn more about Milwaukee County’s ongoing response.
Each county department and elected official is the custodian of their respective records. As a result, each department and each elected official fulfills their own records requests. Therefore, to obtain the records you seek, you need to direct your open records requests to the appropriate record custodian.
For example, if you are looking for pension information, Human Resources would be the custodian of those records. If you are looking for an accident report from an incident on the freeway, the Sheriff's Department would be the custodian of those records.
If you are looking for records related to a piece of property in Milwaukee County, such as those related to zoning or environmental issues, your primary contact should be the municipality where the property is located. Milwaukee County is only the custodian of records related to properties owned or managed by Milwaukee County.
Here are links to the most frequently requested departments. If you're seeking records from a department that is not listed, click here.
County Executive
Records available for request from the County Executive are those relating only to the County Executive or the executive's immediate staff.
Courts
The mission of Combined Court Related Operations is to ensure public safety by providing judges, attorneys, persons proceeding without an attorney and all other persons involved in Circuit Court proceedings or other functions of the Circuit Court with courteous, proficient and professional services.
Ethics Board
Requests for records may be made orally or in writing and addressed to the Ethics Board Executive Director.
House of Correction
The Milwaukee County House of Correction is an honorable organization of committed officers with the integrity to adapt, overcome and achieve. We will maintain and ensure a safe and secure environment that consists of correctional programs to rehabilitate and re-introduce our citizens back into the community.
Human Resources
The Department of Human Resources helps to make Milwaukee County a leading employer with a highperforming, engaged workforce that meets and exceeds business objectives within a supportive and diverse workplace.
Medical Examiner
The Milwaukee County Medical Examiner’s Office is the agency designated by law to investigate deaths from injury, homicide, suicide, deaths under unusual or suspicious circumstances, or when a person is not attended by a physician. The Medical Examiner does not fulfill requests for death certificates.
Personnel Review Board
Requests for records may be made orally or in writing and addressed to Personnel Review Board Executive Secretary.
Sheriff
The Open Records Division maintains and distributes public records for the Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office, including the Milwaukee County Jail.