Maryland has saved nearly half a billion dollars in hospital costs over the last 15 years thanks to expanded insurance coverage. The estimate comes from medical advocacy group Maryland Healthcare for All!, which will present its findings to the Maryland General Assembly later this week. Over the 15 years, the state reduced the number of uninsured from 13% to 6%. “When people go to the hospital without health care coverage under uncompensated hospital care, that’s a hidden health care tax, because it goes right into all of our health insurance premiums,” Vincent DeMarco, president of Maryland Healthcare for All! said. “Because of these health care expansions we have decreased uncompensated hospital care.”

 

Staff at a youth detention center in Baltimore County systemically raped boys incarcerated at the facility, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday. The civil complaint and request for a jury trial center on the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School near Loch Raven, where 37 victims, now men between 30 and 66 years old, allege sexual abuse from the 1970s through 2009. The lawsuit was filed by attorneys from law firms Levy Konigsberg and Brown Kiely on Wednesday morning in Baltimore City Circuit Court against the State of Maryland and the Department of Juvenile Services under the Child Victims Act.

Ahead of a challenging budget year, Maryland lawmakers evaluated the potential costs and savings of expanding health care benefits to residents that do not have access to coverage. Much of the discussion at a House Health and Government Operations Committee meeting Tuesday involved how much it might cost Maryland taxpayers to provide health care coverage to the state’s undocumented populations.

Perhaps it’s because higher education has been so much in the news lately, but Mayor Brandon Scott’s newly unveiled plan to combat vacant housing has the feel of a hastily written undergraduate term paper. It’s overly complicated, insanely ambitious and depends on funding that simply isn’t there. The cynical among us might assume the incumbent is more focused on the Democratic primary five months from now than on offering a realistic proposal to redevelop Baltimore’s scourge of abandoned properties.

In the history of any city, there are a few pivotal moments that will define the urban landscape for generations to come, for better or for worse. Opened 43 years ago as a symbol of Baltimore’s revitalization, few projects have had more significance in Baltimore’s modern history than Harborplace. Its impending rebirth has been awaited anxiously by all who care about our city. The new renderings of Harborplace have prompted the full spectrum of reactions, from ubiquitous political cheerleading to pointed design critiques from UDAAP (the Urban Design & Architecture Advisory Panel) and members of the architectural community.

Light Rail service remains suspended Wednesday after the Maryland Transit Administration announced it would be shut down indefinitely for inspections and repairs. Meanwhile, MTA administrator Holly Arnold appeared before the Maryland Board of Public Works at a meeting. Comptroller Brooke Lierman asked her about several issues including the outage. “It is not a result of the budget actions in the past week. We were doing the overhaul and making sure we had been maintaining the system in a state of repair for the life of the vehicles.

Maryland Transportation Secretary Paul Wiedefeld and other officials have sounded the alarm this year over the long-term health of the well the state taps for funding transportation — as Marylanders hop in more electric and fuel-efficient vehicles over gas guzzlers, the state has brought in less revenue from the gas tax factored into the price at the pump. Last week, Wiedefeld announced his office would be cutting more than $3 billion worth of funding from the state transportation budget it sends to lawmakers for signature, citing declining revenues and increasing costs.

Approximately 9 million lead pipes carry drinking water across the country, according to estimates from the federal Environmental Protection Agency. Under a newly proposed rule, cities and other jurisdictions will be required to replace all service lines made out of the hazardous material within 10 years — but first, they have to find where they are. And that’s where you come in. Baltimore is among the cities asking homeowners to test their own pipes for lead and complete an online survey with their results, as it races to complete a required inventory of its pipes.

 

For so many of us in Baltimore and Maryland, our history is a reminder of what our faith calls us to do: serve. As former pastor of Union Baptist Church and now through my work with the Beloved Community Services Organization in Baltimore, I’m committed to continue the work of those who came before me by advancing the mission of the Civil Rights Movement while serving underserved communities.

At the Frederick County Council, local landowners, conservation groups and recreational users Tuesday pleaded their case for and against proposed zoning changes to Sugarloaf Mountain ahead of a scheduled vote next week. For a year, the mountain, known for its scenic views and sprawling trails, has been the subject of an intense zoning battle between Frederick County and Stronghold Inc., the nonprofit owners of the 3,400-acre mountain and the surrounding 20,000-acre land.