LIERMAN: STATE HAS $555M SURPLUS HEADING INTO BUDGETING: In light of Gov. Wes Moore foreshadowing budget shortfalls last month, Comptroller Brooke Lierman announced Monday morning that Maryland will move into its next budget season with a $555 million surplus. Hannah Gaskill/The Baltimore Sun.
- The surplus is an amount that resembles years when the state wasn’t awash with the COVID-19 relief funding that bolstered personal and business incomes and expanded consumer spending, inflating the state’s budget surpluses to $2 billion budget in fiscal year 2022 and $2.5 billion in fiscal year 2021. Jack Hogan/The Daily Record.
HARFORD CONFLICTS CONTINUE AS STATE’S ATTY ISSUES COMPLAINT: A dust-up over emails could land Harford County Executive Robert Cassilly (R) in court — to answer a potential lawsuit from county State’s Attorney Alison Healey (R). Healey, in a Monday press conference, said she planned to seek a judge’s order requiring Cassilly’s administration to provide access to emails of a key employee who is on emergency family leave. Healey added that she also plans to ask for “millions of dollars” to be used to move her office’s email system off of the Harford County system. Bryan Sears/Maryland Matters.
BRIDGE, TUNNEL TOLLS EXPECTED TO RISE: Maryland drivers may have to pay more in toll fees when they cross bridges and traverse tunnels, reversing a decadelong trend of stagnant pricing. Toll prices have not been raised since 2011, when the Maryland Transportation Authority voted to increase tolls in two phases. Those took effect in 2011 and 2013. Lia Russell and Hannah Gaskill/The Baltimore Sun.
ADVOCATES TO PUSH FOR EXPANDED AUTHORITY OF DRUG PRICING BOARD: A Maryland health care advocacy group announced on Monday that it plans to push state lawmakers to expand the authority of the fledgling Prescription Drug Affordability Board next legislative session. Angela Roberts/The Baltimore Sun.
OPINION: OUTDOORS IS A HEALTHY LEARNING ENVIRONMENT: As children head back to school, it is critical that we give them the best environment in which to learn and grow during the next nine months. Whether one considers students’ physical and mental health, educational achievement or other metrics, it is clear that the best learning environment includes time outside, engaging in educational opportunities within our natural environment. That is why Congress must continue to strengthen the No Child Left Inside Act. U.S. Rep. John Sarbanes and Nicole Veltre-Luton/The Baltimore Banner.
U.S. SENATE RACE: IVEY ENDORSES ALSOBROOKS; TRONE RELEASES VIDEO: U.S. Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-4th) is the 100th endorsement that Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks has received in her run for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, the campaign says. Meanwhile, U.S. Rep. David Trone, who is also seeking the Dem nomination for the Senate, released two television and digital campaign ads. The first 30-second video is titled “Fair Shake” and focuses on Trone growing up on a farm in Pennsylvania where he cleaned hog pens and trudged to an outhouse in the winter. The farm was later lost to foreclosure. William Ford and Danielle Gaines/Maryland Matters.
PROSECUTORS SEEK DENIAL OF DISMISSAL MOTION IN FREDERICK GUN CASE: Federal prosecutors last week argued against local machine gun business owner Robert Krop’s motion asking a federal judge to allow him to file a second motion to dismiss. Prosecutors said Krop was recycling the same arguments from his first motion to dismiss in May. That motion was denied in June. Clara Niels/The Frederick News Post.
MO CO OFFICIALS SEEK RELEASE OF MORE DATA ON BEIDLEMAN PROBE: County officials are applying pressure on Montgomery County Public Schools to release more information regarding the recently finished independent investigation into the promotion of Principal Joel Beidleman despite multiple sexual harassment allegations against him. Em Espey/MoCo 360.
BATES PUBLISHES NEW LIST OF UNTRUSTWORTHY POLICE: Stating that it was important to ensure that those in law enforcement who run afoul of their sworn duties are held accountable, Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates on Monday released an updated list of 60 current and former police officers his office will not call to testify because of concerns that they are untrustworthy. Dylan Segelbaum/The Baltimore Banner.
- The inventory Bates published online includes about 30 fewer officers than the last version maintained by his predecessor, Marilyn Mosby, according to an analysis of the list his office published Monday and an archived version of the last version of Mosby’s list. Alex Mann/The Baltimore Sun.
- Bates’ outlined some of the criteria his office used to create the list: Officers who have formal charges filed through BPD’s Internal Affairs related to behaviors such as a lack of truthfulness, theft or false statements; Officers who are facing criminal charges or who are convicted of crimes related to credibility, like perjury. Emily Hofstaedter/WYPR-FM.
B’MORE GET $4M IN FED FUNDS TO BUILD COMPOST FACILITY: Baltimore has received $4 million of federal funding to build a composting facility at the city’s Eastern Sanitation Yard, which would accept organic waste such as food scraps and turn it into a fertilizer mixture. Christine Condon/The Baltimore Sun.
