Paul Farrow, who ran two small businesses before spending sixteen years in Wisconsin government, died on July 7, 2026. He was 61 and had served as Waukesha County Executive since 2015, according to the Wisconsin State Legislature and FOX6 Milwaukee.

Farrow was born in Milwaukee in 1964, the son of Margaret Farrow, who later became the first woman to serve as lieutenant governor of Wisconsin. He graduated from Marquette University High School in 1982, earned an associate's degree from Waukesha County Technical College in 1987, and completed a bachelor's degree at Carroll College, now Carroll University, in 1991. Before he sought office, he ran a home inspection business and held a partnership in a radon mitigation company.

Voters sent him to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 2010. Two years later he won a special election to the State Senate, representing the Pewaukee area's 33rd District; he was reelected in 2014, when he was also named Legislator of the Year by the Wisconsin Builders Association and won leadership honors from Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce and the state's telecommunications trade association. In 2015 the Senate majority named him Assistant Majority Leader, and that same year Waukesha County elected him its County Executive. Voters returned him to that office in 2019 and again in 2023.

As executive, Farrow founded the Waukesha County Center for Growth to help new and expanding businesses navigate local government, and he co-chaired the region's M7 Economic Development Partnership, according to Waukesha County. He directed the county's unified response during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, an effort credited with getting Waukesha County students back into classrooms by late 2020. His work also drew federal notice: he took part in White House infrastructure summits in 2017, and in 2018 he was appointed to the Intergovernmental Policy Advisory Committee, which counsels the U.S. Trade Representative on matters affecting state and local government.

From 2021 to 2022, he chaired the Republican Party of Wisconsin. In 2025 he received the Tommy G. Thompson Distinguished Public Leadership Award.

County Board Chairman Jim Heinrich, who stepped in as acting county executive, said Farrow was "a devoted public servant, a steady leader, and a proud champion for Waukesha County," adding, "He led with conviction and cared deeply about this community." Waukesha Mayor Alicia Halvensleben said Farrow "devoted much of his life to serving our community with dedication and care."

Farrow and his wife, Amy, made their home in Pewaukee, where they raised two sons; he also became a grandfather. Away from government, he served as a past president of the World Muskie Hunt fishing organization and sat on Carroll University's Presidential Advisory Council, ties to the outdoors and to his alma mater that ran alongside his years in office.

What Farrow left in place in Waukesha County is mostly structural: the Center for Growth he founded to guide local businesses through county government, the M7 partnership he helped steer for the wider region, and more than a decade of county budgets signed under his name. Leadership of the county now passes to Jim Heinrich on an interim basis, with voters to select a permanent successor in a special election. His mother broke a barrier of her own as Wisconsin's first female lieutenant governor; her son built his career close to home, in the county where he grew up and the small businesses he ran before he ever sought office.