The Orioles have spent much of Brandon Hyde’s tenure being looked down upon. They’ve spent almost six months craning necks upward. Sunday, the Orioles clinched their first playoff berth since 2016, the culmination of a rebuilding process that fully launched in the winter of 2018 when Mike Elias was brought in as executive vice president and general manager and hired Hyde as manager to steward a club designed to struggle.

The Frederick County Planning Commission voted 4-2 on Wednesday to grant conditional approval to FirstEnergy, which is working with Quantum Loophole, for an electric substation on Quantum Loophole’s planned data center campus. The site plan will receive final approval on the condition that the Maryland Department of the Environment approves a new environmental management plan from Quantum Loophole for its planned campus.

 

Giant Food opened a new warehouse in Hanover in 2019 to try and capture market share in the new grocery delivery space. Four years later, the grocer is planning to close the warehouse next month, laying off more than 300 people. Giant isn’t the only large employer in the state ramping up layoffs even as Maryland isenjoying record-low unemployment. The Work Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) log maintained by the state Department of Labor has already seen 56 entries through the end of August, nearly matching last year’s total of 64.

As we approach yet another winter since the first COVID-19 case was diagnosed in the United States in January 2020, the landscape of what has been a deadly virus looks vastly different. Federal health officials approved another iteration of the COVID vaccine this week to protect against the newest strains of the virus. The Maryland Department of Health, in May, moved away from daily COVID updates to weekly updates. Social distancing and masking now are largely voluntary measures.

 

More than 300,000 American workers have gone on strike since the beginning of the year, asserting their right to a living wage, good benefits, safe working conditions amid steadily rising temperatures, and so much more. Workers are feeling empowered in a way that they haven’t in decades, recognizing that every American deserves to live with dignity — but millions in our country are considered the working poor, individuals who dedicate 27-plus hours each week to work but nonetheless live in poverty.

Thousands of members of the United Automobile Workers union went on strike Friday at three plants in three Midwestern states in what was the first strike simultaneously affecting all three Detroit automakers. The union and the companies — General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis, the parent of Chrysler — remained deadlocked in negotiations over a new collective bargaining agreement when the current contract expired at 11:59 p.m. on Thursday.

The Housing Authority of Baltimore City is disputing allegations that it owes millions of dollars in overdue water bills to the city as “wildly inaccurate,” arguing that the actual total is far lower. Baltimore’s inspector general published a report Tuesday stating that the city’s internal figures show the housing authority was behind on water bill payments to the tune of $7.8 million. But the report also pointed to several problems with the Department of Public Works’ billing system, which could be contributing to confusion about the housing authority’s total charges for its roughly 7,000 properties.

The Montgomery County Police Department (MCPD) hosted community events in Silver Spring on Sept. 6 and Wheaton on Tuesday to discuss its proposed “Drone as First Responder” (DFR) Program. The program will use drones to “fly to a call for service and arrive prior to, or in conjunction with, first responders on the ground,” and would be used to “evaluate the scene and circumstances before officers arrive and while an event is ongoing,” police said in their presentation on Sept. 6.

A video content convention that started in Southern California will make its East Coast debut in Baltimore later this month. VidCon, a convention centered around video content platforms and creators, will take place at the Baltimore Convention Center from Sept. 28 to Oct. 1. The convention, which signed a three-year deal, has long eyed an East Coast event and settled on Baltimore because of its location near several major cities and because of a cross-country connection between two tourism departments.

Transportation officials say they are exploring seasonal pay increases to attract drivers and conductors ahead of the 2024 season. On Tuesday, officials provided members of the Ocean City Transportation Committee with an update on seasonal recruitment. As preparations for the 2024 season commence, Transit Manager Rob Shearman said staff are exploring a 3% pay increase for new and turning seasonal bus and tram employees.