Tell Healey:
No New Women's Prison
Despite years of organizing by directly impacted women across Massachusetts, state leadership continues pushing forward a new women’s prison project when what our communities truly need are investments in harm reduction, rehabilitation, and transformative justice.
The project was first proposed at $50 million. Today, it has ballooned to $360 million, with no clear public explanation for the massive increase.
This session, organizers refiled the Jail and Prison Construction Moratorium, which would place a five-year pause on prison design, planning, and construction. The bill has already passed favorably out of the State Administration and Regulatory Oversight Committee and now moves to Ways and Means.
Instead of expanding the prison system for another generation, we should be moving in a different direction: fundamentally overhauling our criminal legal system and investing in restorative and transformative justice rather than punishment and abuse.