A 24,000-square-foot strip mall in a popular Howard County suburb has traded for $5.4 million. Mosaic Realty Partners acquired the Columbia Gateway Plaza at 7185 Columbia Gateway Drive on May 3. The retail complex is about 90% leased with anchors that include Dunkin, Weight Watchers, Columbia Bank and the Backstage Dance Studio.

In the final weeks of his life, 99-year-old John Valancius received a beautiful medal for what 19-year-old John Valancius did as an American soldier in France. On April 8, in a brief ceremony in a Pennsylvania restaurant, a French diplomat presented him with the Légion d’Honneur, pinning the medal to his lapel and thanking him for his role in liberating France from German occupation during World War II.

 

Lynn Harshman has been a Frederick County resident for more than five decades — her entire life. She’s an avid gardener and history fan, two things that Frederick County specializes in. Harshman recently joined the Myersville-Wolfsville Area Historical Society (MWAHS) and wanted to “combine my passions of antiques, history and gardens so tour participants will experience how the old and the new of garden plantings can nicely intertwine.”

For the past month, Baltimore County Council members have heard two versions of the consequences of passing Bill 31-24. Either the measure will ease or prevent overcrowded school districts, or it will further hamstring the county’s efforts to build more affordable housing and expand its shrinking tax base. The measure addresses something called the Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance, which the county first enacted about two decades ago.

The way Harvey Blonder sees it, his proposal to build a 190-room hotel, restaurants with different themes, a wedding venue and a pool with a swim-up bar would only enhance the area off Route 2 overlooking the South River. Blonder said the proposal to transform the site of the Liberty Marina would bring new jobs and boost the tax revenue that flows to Anne Arundel County and the state.

Across the nation, lower-income families rely on America’s largest agricultural and nutrition legislation, known as the “Farm Bill.” It defines commodity pricing for farmers, encourages environmental stewardship, and importantly, provides nutrition assistance for low-income households including through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

Are we done with the Marilyn Mosby drama now? Can the people of Baltimore move on? Can Our City of Perpetual Recovery recover from this episode and get focused on the future? There’s a whole downtown that needs rejuvenation, vacant houses that need to be renovated and a population that needs to grow. The incumbent and so-far-corruption-free mayor just won his primary election, and for a Democrat that means another term, so there’s promise in that.

Midway through presenting results of their research into a microgrid for Naval Air Station Sigonella in Sicily, searching for balance between solar and diesel, one of the midshipmen paused as slides of complicated graphs and charts appeared out of order. It’s May 1, the first day of summer whites at the Naval Academy. High up in a third-floor classroom of Hopper Hall, the slightly flustered mid asked his colleagues to go back. Go forward. Go back.

Dark German ales and soft pretzels aren’t always enough to fill up Crossbar in Federal Hill on weeknights. But when you throw in some bar trivia, it turns into one of the beer hall’s busiest nights of the week. Ryan Bailey, Crossbar’s general manager, said the trivia game brings in about 150 players every Wednesday night. The bar isn’t open on Mondays or Tuesdays because it costs too much to open on slower nights given the size of the space.

Maryland has joined the U.S. Justice Department’s case filed Thursday against Live Nation Entertainment Inc. and its wholly owned subsidiary Ticketmaster LLC for monopolistic and anti-competitive practices in the live entertainment industry. “When the world’s largest live entertainment company illegally dominates ticket sales, artist management and promotion, and venue choices, fans are the ones who are hurt the most,” Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown said in a statement announcing the state’s participation in the case.