Maura Healey Using A Gas-Guzzling SUV As Governor of Massachusetts

By State House News Service | January 12, 2023, 16:31 EST

Maura Healey, Massachusetts attorney general. State House News Service file photo by Sam Doran.

By Colin Young
State House News Service

Governor Maura Healey promised in her inaugural address last week that she will electrify the state’s fleet of vehicles and put a million electric vehicles on the road by 2030, but she has not yet made the switch to an EV herself.

As she starts her term as governor, Healey is still riding around in the same type of sport utility vehicle that she used as attorney general, a Ford Expedition, her office said. Like her predecessors in the corner office, Healey has a Massachusetts State Police detail and driver, and her choice of vehicle is similar to the SUV that former governor Charlie Baker used.

Ford Expeditions from model years 2018-2022 average between 17 and 20 miles to the gallon of gasoline, according to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. Ford does not make an electric version of the Expedition.

In her first speech as governor, Healey said last week that she would “electrify our public fleet, and put a million electric vehicles on the road by 2030.” In a statement Tuesday, January 10, her office said that Healey is still figuring out the best way and time to do that.

“The Governor has committed to electrifying the public fleet and will be evaluating the best methods and timeline for that transition,” press secretary Karissa Hand said in response to questions about the governor’s vehicle.

Getting to a million electric vehicles in Massachusetts by the end of the decade will be a big shift — the previous energy and environmental affairs secretary said this fall that there were roughly 55,000 electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids on the roads in Massachusetts. As of December 2017, when the firm ICF released a study of state fleet electrification opportunities it conducted for the state Department of Energy Resources, there were 7,833 on-road vehicles owned and operated by the Commonwealth.

New to NewBostonPost?  Conservative media is hard to find in Massachusetts.  But you’ve found it.  Now dip your toe in the water for two bucks — $2 for two months.  And join the real revolution.