Vaping among high school students in the U.S. fell sharply from 2023 to 2024, a trend that was mirrored in Maryland but at a slower pace, according to health advocates and state officials. Data released Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that about 1.63 million middle and high school students regularly used e-cigarettes this year, or 5.9% of students surveyed for the 2024 National Youth Tobacco Survey.

Democrats have poured record amounts of cash into defending Maryland’s once reliably blue Senate seat, investing to fend off an unprecedented GOP offensive behind former governor Larry Hogan’s bid to flip the seat. Maryland’s unusually competitive race between Hogan and Democrat Angela D. Alsobrooks for the seat her party has held for decades has cost at least six times more than the state’s last contest for an open Senate seat — drawing at least $84.6 million combined in contributions, according to the most recent campaign finance reports filed this week.

Kelly Madigan is not running for anything, but she would like your vote anyway. Madigan is Baltimore County’s first inspector general, a role she has held since 2020. The Nov. 5 ballot includes a question about whether the inspector general’s office should be enshrined in the Baltimore County Charter. It’s needed, she and others say, because while public officials love to talk about transparency and accountability, they don’t always walk the walk.

I bumped into Karen Simpson in Frederick. We were at an outdoor reception for a conference on Maryland main streets, enjoying what felt like the first cool night of fall. Six years ago, she was a long-shot Democrat running for the House of Delegates in ruby-red Pasadena. Predictably, she lost. Then her husband got a job as a pastor in Frederick, and rather than waiting for retirement to join him — the city had always been their dream — friends pointed out an opportunity.

The good news is that Maryland Governor Wes Moore announced that the state will spend more than $75 million per year toward the goal of converting at least 5,000 vacant properties in Baltimore into homeownership or other productive uses in the next five years. The bad news is that Mayor Brandon Scott still has not come up with a credible plan on how to manage the complex process of acquiring, rehabilitating and disposing of vacant and derelict properties.

From modest beginnings on the campus of Hood College, the Frederick Innovative Technology Center Inc. has grown into an important part of Frederick County’s business scene. The incubator celebrated its 20th anniversary at an event Thursday. FITCI has helped start 257 companies in its 20 years of existence, FITCI CEO Kathie Callahan Brady said Thursday.

 

A Howard County-based produce wholesaler is closing its doors and potentially putting over 400 people out of work less than two weeks before the Christmas holiday. Lancaster Foods notified the Maryland Department of Labor this week that it will close its Jessup plant by Dec. 14 and lay off as many as 424 employees. A representative for Lancaster referred a reporter to The Coastal Companies, which declined to comment.

On January 27, 2021, then Gov. Larry Hogan announced some good news for affordable housing in Maryland: nearly $40 million in competitive awards to spur construction of 18 low-income housing projects. “During our administration,” Hogan said, “The State of Maryland has provided financing and tax credits to create or preserve more than 20,000 affordable rental units across the state—an unprecedented level of production.” (Photo: Graeme Sloan—Bloomberg/Getty Images/Time)

This summer, around 150 people jumped into the Inner Harbor for the first Harbor Splash. The Waterfront Partnership’s Healthy Harbor report shows many areas of the harbor are safe for swimming. A majority of sites have good or improving bacteria scores. The report found the Inner Harbor is safe for swimming 80% of the time.

Pardon me for bringing up something we’d rather not think about: Some nurses in Maryland paid for fake grades and received bogus diplomas from bogus nursing schools. As I said, we’d rather not think about that. This is the United States of America, the greatest country in the history of countries, and, while the current Republican presidential candidate can constantly lie and be inexplicably adored by millions, we will neither adore nor tolerate health care professionals lying about their credentials.