Additional branch campuses in Garfield County are located in Glenwood Springs, Rifle, and Carbondale.

GCSO also oversees the county's emergency management, search and rescue, and tactical response functions.

RFTA is the second-largest public transportation entity in Colorado (behind the Denver area's Regional Transportation District), and the largest rural public transit provider in the United States, operating busses across a 70-mile stretch from Rifle to Aspen.

Bustang, Colorado's inter-city bus service, runs its east-west route from Denver Union Station to Grand Junction, making stops in Glenwood Springs, Rifle, and Parachute.

Although the county includes the relatively liberal cities of Carbondale and Glenwood Springs, this is somewhat outweighed by the nearby towns of Rifle, Silt, Parachute, and Battlement Mesa.

Until 2020, the most recent Democratic win was by Bill Clinton in 1992, but Republicans were held to a plurality of the county's votes in half of the six following presidential elections prior to 2020.

In 2020, Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the county since Clinton in 1992, with about 50% of the vote.

The county's leftward trend continued significantly in 2022, during which it backed the Democratic candidates and eventual winners in every statewide race.