State leaders have decided to close MCI-Concord, the oldest men’s prison in the Bay State, as a way to save money amid the state’s lowest prison population in decades.

The Gov. Maura Healey administration on Wednesday announced that the Massachusetts Department of Correction will soon conclude operations at MCI-Concord, a medium-security men’s prison.

MCI-Concord currently operates at 50% capacity, with an incarcerated population of about 300 inmates.

Massachusetts is expected to save about $16 million a year due to the closure, Administration and Finance Secretary Matthew Gorzkowicz said Wednesday. The state will also save about $190 million in one-time upkeep costs.

The cost-savings move was taken as Healey looks to check spending as revenue growth slows down compared to the pandemic-era boom times.

“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,” a spokesperson for the state Executive Office of Public Safety and Security said in a statement.

The Massachusetts Department of Correction will transfer correctional officers and incarcerated individuals throughout this fiscal year. The transfer process is expected to be complete by this summer.

“Today, I am deeply encouraged that the Healey-Driscoll administration has decided to close MCI-Concord prison,” said State Sen. Jamie Eldridge, who serves as the Senate Chair of the Joint Committee on Judiciary and the Criminal Justice Reform Caucus.

“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,” Eldridge later added.

The Department of Correction last year closed MCI-Cedar Junction (Walpole) prison, saving about $15 million a year in operating costs.

“The planned closure of MCI-Concord will likely save about the same amount of money, on top of avoiding new capital investments in the oldest men’s prison in Massachusetts,” Eldridge said.

He added, “With this news, I encourage the Healey-Driscoll administration and the Legislature to consider using this anticipated savings for the purposes of ‘justice reinvestment,’ investing taxpayer dollars in education, programming and re-entry services for incarcerated people and returning citizens, and in communities across Massachusetts that have often been unjustly targeted by mass incarceration and the War on Drugs.”