Maryland General Assembly session opens with optimism, warnings about the months ahead

Maryland lawmakers — buzzing with both optimism and concerns about an increasingly tenuous state budget situation and still robust plans that could make that financial problem even tougher — converged Wednesday in Annapolis for the first day of the Maryland General Assembly’s three-month session. Addressing public safety concerns and dealing with growing budget issues were major topics of conversation for many of the 188 lawmakers and hundreds of other activists and lobbyists who filled the historic State House and will return throughout the annual 90-day lawmaking sprint — the 446th such gathering for the historic governing body.