To the Editor:
We are very concerned by the Healey-Driscoll plan to spend $360 million plus interest on construction at the state’s prison for women, MCI-Framingham. We strongly believe this plan should be shelved.
Because of federal cuts to our state, residents have lost jobs, health insurance, and SNAP. Thousands of families are on a waiting list for child care. Residents are in dire need of affordable housing.
We know that some of the buildings that make up the prison complex in Framingham are old and in poor shape. The prison has an operational capacity of 668 women. There are fewer than half that number as of July 2026 (with an average daily population of 236 over the previous year). Of the 253 women at the prison in July:
-Only 191 women are serving a sentence, and one-third of those women were sentenced to less than five years;
-The rest have not even been convicted of a crime. Instead, 46 are being held pre-trial, often because they are too poor to post bail, while six were civilly committed, meaning they need drug treatment and mental health services.
The average age is 41, with the oldest woman 80 years old. Starting at age 50, people in prison are considered elderly because of what is known as accelerated aging; that is, prison conditions take such a toll on people’s health that their bodies age faster. The Legislature passed a law in 2018 permitting individuals who are terminally ill or permanently incapacitated to apply for medical parole, but very few women have been approved to leave prison under this law.
A report by the Women and Incarceration Project at Suffolk University finds that most women score as minimum security risks on the state’s “Objective Point-Based [Classification] System.”
Despite all of this, the governor’s plan keeps the prison as a medium-security institution. Medium-security prisons are more costly to run and more restrictive for the women serving time. The Department of Correction (DOC) reports that it spends more than $250,000 to incarcerate each woman for one year. This substantial sum doesn’t provide women with comfortable mattresses or fresh food, let alone sufficient opportunity to prepare to return to the community, get a job, and afford to live. In Fiscal Year 2025, as in other recent years, the DOC spent only two percent of its budget on programs for incarcerated people.
Perhaps most compelling is that women have testified to legislative committees that the biggest problems they face stem from DOC’s policies and practices, not the condition of the buildings.
As residents of Arlington with backgrounds in education, social services, law and policy, and women’s rights, we recommend the following course of action:
-Governor’s Administration: Hit pause on the plan to borrow hundreds of millions of dollars for prison construction;
-DOC and Governor: Make sure that incarcerated women are able to access the medical parole process;
-Legislature and Governor: Work together next session to pass elder parole and the Survivors’ Act, so that older women–some of whom have dementia–and those who were convicted for acts of self-defense against abusers have a chance to leave prison or avoid prison.
Barbara J. Dougan, Esq., Hamilton Road
Nora Mann, Esq., Wollaston Avenue
Rachel Roth, member, Women and Incarceration Project, Chandler Street
June Rowe, Reproductive Justice activist, Kensington Road
Marlene Silva, Democratic State Committee member, 4th Middlesex, Newland Road
This letter was published on Sept. 12, 2026.
