MarylandReporter.com (https://marylandreporter.com/category/news/)
Capital News Service gathered data from the 2019 legislative session and conducted an analysis to report on some of the most striking takeaways from the General Assembly. In the Senate and House of Delegates, 188 legislators introduced 2,497 bills, which includes 16 joint resolutions. Both chambers passed 866 bills, two of which were joint resolutions.
Children from lower-income families are concentrated in Columbia’s older neighborhoods and the Route 1 corridor because that’s where their parents can afford to live. Achieving equity in education for these students requires the additional resources laid out by the Kirwan Commision on Innovation and Excellence in Education. Simply moving them to higher performing schools, as the superintendent has proposed, is not enough.
Del. Trent Kittleman, R-9A Howard County, the grandmother of six students in Howard County public schools, questions Superintendent Michael Martirano plan to move 7,400 students to relieve overcrowding but also to achieve “socioeconomic integration.” Kittleman says the moves will harm many children.
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State union employees told lawmakers Tuesday they are concerned that staff shortages — of about 2,600, according to a 2018 study — are causing safety issues, including some injuries, for employees at certain agencies.
Longtime Del. Tawanna Gaines resigns amid charges of wire fraud; Maryland state agencies are struggling to handle thousands of public records requests, survey finds; how will members of the General Assembly greet the latest plans for the Preakness and Pimlico? Despite the questions, so far, so good; Comptroller Franchot criticizes Bay Bridge resurfacing, wants work suspended; Maryland Live, Horseshoe casino revenues slow; with three contenders, GOP primary for Cecil County exec expected to heat up; in attempt to avoid further ‘Healthy Holly’ scandals, city bill proposed to require elected leaders disclose client lists; and more than 650 pit bulls euthanized in Prince George’s since January 2018.
The cries of outrage and opposition by Anne Arundel officials of both parties were predictable when the Maryland Transportation Authority announced in August that it had narrowed it choices for a third Chesapeake Bay bridge.
Hundreds of Maryland laws go into effect Tuesday, spanning subjects from increasing the age to buy cigarettes and vapes to taxing online sales and banning bump stocks for firearms. Here is a short summary of more than 70 of the new laws, including a link to their full legislative history and slug lines that make the list easy to scan.
A team of researchers studying dolphins in the Potomac River got unexpected fruit from their labors last month when they witnessed a dolphin being born near the river’s confluence with the Chesapeake Bay. Bottlenose dolphins are among the most studied species in the world, but a wild birth has only been documented in scientific literature on one other occasion: in 2013 off the coast of Georgia.
Legal but politically stupid. That was the decision last week by the workgroup on school spending to go into closed session to begin hashing out funding formulas. This was a shocker from a commission that has been remarkably open and transparent.
The Maryland Board of Revenue Estimates voted unanimously Thursday to increase the state’s projected revenues for the current fiscal year by just under $130 million, but cautioned that the uptick “is not indicative of long-term economic growth.”
