State Roundup, August 15, 2017

State Roundup, August 15, 2017

Statue of Chief Justice Roger Brook Taney in front of State House. Photo by Capital News Service, Connor Glowacki

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FATE OF REBEL STATUES: Pressure is mounting on Maryland state leaders to remove a State House statue depicting one of the state’s foremost defenders of slavery, with a Democratic candidate for governor, the speaker of the Maryland House and a progressive group calling for its riddance Monday, Ovetta Wiggins and Josh Hicks of the Post report.

JEALOUS CHALLENGES HOGAN ON STATUE: Maryland Democratic gubernatorial candidate Benjamin Jealous said Monday that Republican President Donald Trump did not go far enough to condemn displays of white supremacy after violent clashes boiled over in Charlottesville. He also challenged Gov. Larry Hogan to remove a statue of a controversial Supreme Court justice in Annapolis, Andrew Metcalf reports in Bethesda Beat.

HONORING REAL MARYLAND HEROES: Sun columnist Dan Rodricks offers some creative ideas about what to do with the city statues once they are torn down, such as melting them and turning them into coins honoring real Maryland heroes such as Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman, selling them and giving the procedes to the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.

8 RX POT GROWERS GET FINAL OK: Maryland’s medical marijuana regulators approved final licenses for eight growing companies on Monday, allowing them to start cultivating the drug. Erin Cox of the Sun reports that several companies said they are ready to begin growing immediately, while others say they will take weeks to get started. Until Monday, just one of the 15 selected firms had received final permission to start cultivating medical marijuana, which was first legalized in the state in 2013.

RX POT DEADLINE EXTENSION SOUGHT: Some of the nearly 20 companies seeking to grow or process medical cannabis in Maryland run the risk of having their licenses rescinded by a state commission, reports Bryan Sears of the Daily Record. Patrick Jameson, executive director of the Maryland Medical Cannabis Commission, urged members of the panel to consider extensions of the one-year deadline to receive final approval on a case-by-case basis. Some companies, he said, will have legitimate reasons for seeking an extension.

HATE GROUPS IN MARYLAND: Hate crimes in Maryland are on the rise according to Maryland State Police. Already this year, several suspected hate crimes have been linked to a Maryland resident. While the Southern Poverty Law Center cites 18 hate groups in the State of Maryland, MSP lists a total of five, reports Joy Lepola for WBFF-TV.

PLANK QUITS TRUMP PANEL: Under Armour founder Kevin Plank became the second CEO to resign from President Donald J. Trump’s advisory jobs panel on Monday after the president was widely criticized for not quickly denouncing groups that marched at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., Jeff Barker reports in the Sun.

JOHNS ENTERS DELEGATE RACE: A 32-year-old Chevy Chase Democrat says she’s running for a District 18 seat in the House of Delegates because the state needs more women in elective office. Mila Johns said she’s lived in Maryland all her life, and watching Sen. Barbara Mikulski retire without a woman in the state’s congressional delegation was deeply upsetting, Doug Tallman writes in MyMCMedia.

WHILE VACATIONING … Josh Kurtz of Maryland Matters goes over a short list of newsworthy items that occurred while he took a vacation out west, including John Delaney’s decision to run for president and David Trone’s decision to run for Delaney’s House seat.

FRAZIER WITHDRAWS ORDINANCE: Taneytown Councilman Donald Frazier stood outside of City Hall on Monday evening to discuss censuring other council members following his wife’s failed lawsuit against the city, but ultimately withdrew the ordinance, Heather Mongilio of the Carroll County Times reports.

About The Author

Cynthia Prairie

cynthiaprairie@gmail.com
https://www.chestertelegraph.org/

Contributing Editor Cynthia Prairie has been a newspaper editor since 1979, when she began working at The Raleigh Times. Since then, she has worked for The Baltimore News American, The Chicago Sun-Times, The Prince George’s Journal and Baltimore County newspapers in the Patuxent Publishing chain, including overseeing The Jeffersonian when it was a two-day a week business publication. Cynthia has won numerous state awards, including the Maryland State Bar Association’s Gavel Award. Besides compiling and editing the daily State Roundup, she runs her own online newspaper, The Chester Telegraph. If you have additional questions or comments contact Cynthia at: cynthiaprairie@gmail.com

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