Minnesota Correctional Facility – Rush City

A close-security state prison for men in Rush City, Minnesota — opened in 2000, and the Minnesota DOC's central mailing address for visitor applications.

Overview

Minnesota Correctional Facility – Rush City (MCF-Rush City) is a state prison for men operated by the Minnesota Department of Corrections. It is in Rush City, in Chisago County, in east-central Minnesota. The facility opened in 2000 and houses men in close custody (Level 4).

The Minnesota DOC assigns a custody level based on factors that include sentence length, time remaining, and conduct, and a person’s custody level can change during incarceration. The custody class and housing unit held at a given prison affect how visits are arranged, so families confirm the arrangement that applies to the specific person before a first visit.

What Makes MCF-Rush City Different

MCF-Rush City is one of Minnesota’s close-security (Level 4) prisons for men, opened in 2000. It also serves a statewide administrative role: it is the central mailing address for visitor applications across the Minnesota DOC. A person applying to visit anyone in a Minnesota state prison mails the visitor application to MCF-Rush City, which processes it as part of the approved-visitor-list system used by all of the state’s facilities. That central role does not change where a visit takes place — once a visitor is approved, the visit is arranged at the prison where the person is actually held.

Visiting

The statewide MN DOC rules above — the approved visitor list, the dress code, ID, and item limits — apply at MCF-Rush City. The facility’s own arrangements:

Getting There and Parking

MCF-Rush City is at 7600 525th Street in Rush City, in Chisago County in east-central Minnesota. Rush City is along Interstate 35 between the Twin Cities and Duluth, and the facility is reached from the I-35 Rush City exit. The nearest large commercial airport is in the Minneapolis–St. Paul area to the south.

Parking is on site. Visitors confirm current entry procedures, the visitor-processing location, and what may be brought onto the grounds with the facility before arriving, because electronic devices and personal items are generally not permitted inside.

Nearby Services

Rush City has limited lodging and dining, with additional options in nearby Chisago County and Pine County communities along the Interstate 35 corridor and a wider range in the Twin Cities area to the south. Emergency medical care is available locally, with larger hospitals in the Twin Cities. Visitors traveling a long distance generally find the most options for fuel, food, and overnight stays along I-35.

Mail

Minnesota does not deliver friends-and-family mail to the prison. Since November 1, 2024, the Minnesota DOC has personal mail processed off-site by a private vendor, TextBehind, which scans or photocopies each item and sends the copies to the facility (electronic delivery to the person’s tablet is also available for a fee). Mail sent directly to a Minnesota prison is returned to the sender.

Address personal mail this way:

First Name / Last Name, and OID number MCF-Rush City, Minnesota (do not abbreviate Minnesota) P.O. Box 247 Phoenix, MD 21131

Items missing a first and last name or the OID number are rejected, and envelopes without complete information are discarded unopened. Mail between two incarcerated people, pen-pal mail, and photo orders also go to the TextBehind address.

Some mail still goes directly to the facility, not to TextBehind: legal mail; published materials, books, and subscription renewals; business mail from courts, counties, child support, and other government agencies; and vital documents such as birth certificates, Social Security cards, and IDs (TextBehind forwards these to the facility). Legal mail is sent to the facility’s own address, and incarcerated people use the facility address as the return address on outgoing legal mail.

Verify the current mailing rules and the facility’s address before sending anything.

Learn More

• Visiting a Minnesota prison — getting on the approved visitor list, scheduling, and what to expect at the visit.
• Sending mail — how the TextBehind scanning system works and how to address letters, photos, and legal mail.
• Phone & video — ViaPath phone calls and JPay Video Connect video visits.
• Sending money — depositing funds through JPay and where government or corporate checks go.
• Medical care — how health care is provided in Minnesota prisons and how to raise a concern.
• Transfers & intake — where people enter the system (men at MCF-St. Cloud, women at MCF-Shakopee) and how transfers work.