Transfers & Finding Someone in Utah (UDC)

How Placement Works

A person entering Utah’s prison system goes through Receiving & Orientation — the Fremont unit at the Salt Lake City prison handles intake, and the Gunnison prison runs its own R&O sections — where medical, dental, mental health, and case management assessments lead to a classification decision. That classification, along with factors UDC lists (security level, medical and mental health status, programming needs, conviction, institutional history, and gang affiliation), determines where the person is housed. Classification decisions are not grievable under UDC’s published process.

Placement can be any of three kinds of places: one of the two state prisons, a contracted county jail, or — for people on probation or parole — one of six community correctional centers along the Wasatch Front.

A Quarter of State Inmates Are in County Jails

Utah’s prisons do not have enough beds for everyone in state custody. Through the Inmate Placement Program (IPP), UDC publishes that about 25 percent of state inmates live in county jails that contract with the state — currently 20 of them, from Box Elder and Cache in the north to Iron, Kane, and Washington in the south.

What UDC publishes about life in an IPP jail:

• Services exist — recreation, commissary, mail, phones, visitation — but “the policies for these activities will vary from jail to jail.” UDC does not publish the individual jails’ procedures, so the county jail itself is the source for its visiting schedule, phone system, and deposit method.
• UDC’s IPP page states medical care for state inmates in jails is provided by UDC medical staff (the page predates the 2023 move of prison healthcare to the state health department), and people with high-need medical or mental health conditions are generally not placed in jails.
• A person can ask their case manager about transferring to a county jail, and UDC staff routinely visit the jails to meet with inmates and address questions or concerns.

For a family, the practical takeaway: rules that apply at the state prisons — the phone vendor, the scanned-mail system, the deposit fees described in these guides — do not automatically apply at a county jail. Confirm with the jail directly.

Tracking a Location or Transfer

UDC publishes no policy of proactively telling families about routine transfers. Two tools fill the gap:

• Offender Search (corrections.utah.gov) — shows the person’s current location (including a county jail), housing facility, release date and type, and the assigned case manager’s name and email. It covers only people under UDC supervision; someone awaiting trial in a county jail will not appear.
• VINE (1-877-884-8463 or vinelink.com) — UDC’s free, anonymous notification service, open to victims and community members alike. Registrants are notified if a person is released, transferred, escapes, or dies, and can check custody status by name or offender number around the clock.

Out-of-State Transfers

Interstate transfers run through the Interstate Corrections Compact and are rare — UDC’s most recent annual report counted 23 Utah inmates housed in other states (FY2023). The published conditions: the person must have immediate family in the destination state, the person or family prepays all round-trip travel costs including escorting officers, and the receiving state must agree.

Community Correctional Centers

UDC’s six community correctional centers (four in Salt Lake County, one each in Weber and Utah counties) house people on probation or parole, not prison transfers. Visiting works differently there: prospective visitors apply through the online visiting application, and the center’s administrators follow up directly.

Verify Before Acting

For the general, nationwide overview of this topic, see the national guide: Visiting Basics.