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State’s oldest running men’s prison is shutting down in Concord
The Department of Correction said it hopes to wind down operations at MCI-Concord by this summer.
The oldest men’s prison in Massachusetts is shutting down in Concord amid a decline in the state prison population, officials said Wednesday.
The Massachusetts Department of Correction said it plans to cease operations at the medium-security MCI-Concord by this summer. Correctional officers and inmates at the prison — which opened in 1878 — will be transferred to other facilities throughout the fiscal year.
“Amid the state’s lowest prison population in 35 years, this action reflects the Department’s ongoing efforts to enhance operational efficiency, advance cost-saving solutions, and deepen investments in programming and services,” the Department of Correction said in a statement.
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Among the prison’s most notable inmates over the years were civil rights icon Malcolm X and former priest and convicted child molester John Geoghan.
MCI-Concord is currently operating at 50% capacity with an incarcerated population of about 300 inmates, the department said, adding that more details about the transition will come during Gov. Maura Healey’s fiscal year 2025 budget proposal Wednesday afternoon.
State Sen. Jamie Eldridge, Senate chair of the Joint Committee on Judiciary and the Criminal Justice Reform Caucus, said he was “deeply encouraged” by the decision to close MCI-Concord.
“Given the declining number of incarcerated people in state prisons, the challenges of providing modern education, programming and re-entry support to incarcerated people in aging buildings, and the state’s fiscal challenges, this is a common sense decision that strikes yet another blow in the criminal justice reform movement to end mass incarceration,” the Marlborough Democrat said in a statement.
He noted that the recent closure of MCI-Cedar Junction in Walpole saved the state about $15 million in operating costs and predicted that the state could save about the same amount by shutting down MCI-Concord. Eldridge suggested the savings could be put toward education, programming, and re-entry services for incarcerated people and returning citizens, as well as local communities “that have often been unjustly targeted by mass incarceration and the War on Drugs.”
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As an Acton native, he said, “driving through the Concord Rotary past MCI-Concord on Route 2, looking out on the prison reminded me of the injustices and inequalities that exist in Massachusetts, and the need for all concerned residents, elected officials, responsible parties of crimes, and state agencies and institutions to work together to create a more fair, just and equal Commonwealth.”
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