The Maryland Senate passed the controversial Gun Safety Act of 2023, which limits the circumstances where someone can carry a weapon even with a concealed carry permit, on Monday evening following a spirited debate. Initially sponsored by Sen. Jeff Waldstreicher, D-Montgomery, and then-Sen. Susan Lee, D-Montgomery, now Secretary of State, the bill, SB 1, would tighten state gun laws in an effort to combat gun violence and in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that rendered some Maryland gun laws unconstitutional. Following friendly amendments on the Senate floor, the bill now has 24 sponsors.

 

While Montgomery County is dominated by elected leaders who are concerned with things like adding bike lanes on Old Georgetown Road, which don’t get used but severely clog traffic, and who promote drag shows for minor children at local libraries, Northern Virginia continues to grow its economic base and generate revenue that will lessen the financial burden on working taxpayers.

 

A bill making its way through the Maryland General Assembly could have major implications for how social media companies handle children’s consumer privacy nationwide, and a Montgomery County delegate is behind it. “This bill is really creating a framework that requires social media companies to be able to design their products while thinking through the lens of harm that could potentially be done to children,” said bill sponsor Del. Jared Solomon (D), who represents District 18 which includes parts of Silver Spring, Bethesda and Wheaton.

 

Marilyn R. Goldwater, an emergency-room nurse by training who served 24 years in the Maryland House of Delegates, where she became known as an advocate for improving and expanding health care across the state, died Jan. 7 at her daughter’s home in Manhattan Beach, Calif. She was 95. The cause was complications from Parkinson’s disease, said her daughter, Diane “Dee” Goldwater.

Maryland aims to have 300,000 electric vehicles on the road by 2025. As of Dec. 31, 2022, there were 62,744 EVs registered in the state. As the number of EVs in Maryland continues to grow, it is essential that the state’s EV charging infrastructure keeps pace. One crucial aspect of growing the infrastructure is ensuring that the EV charging stations are fully functional.

Attorney General Anthony Brown said his office on Monday sent a judge the proposed redactions for its report on Catholic clergy sexual abuse, meeting the deadline to do so. The redacted names, which many number more than 200, include individuals who are living, are accused of abuse, or hiding, enabling, assisting in the cover-up of abuse, or protecting abusers from the consequences of their actions, and whose identities were revealed as a result of a grand-jury subpoena, according to a statement from Brown.

Maryland’s requirement of a background check and firearm-safety course for those wanting to acquire a handgun is in danger because no similar regulation existed before the 1900s, appeals court judges indicated Friday as they heard arguments on the regulation. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year that to restrict gun possession, “the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation” through the end of the 19th century.

Montgomery County is seeing increased interest in farming among people of color – and developing guidance to help new and established farmers who are Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC). The Montgomery County Office of Agriculture and the Montgomery Countryside Alliance, a farmland protection nonprofit, announced this week that they will be partnering on an online guide for BIPOC farmers to strike a balance between the county’s commitment to equality and agriculture, and to provide farmers of color with “specific resources to get growing and sustain farm ventures in the county.”

 

 

As each Maryland senator with the Judicial Proceedings Committee cast their yes vote, David Lorenz cried and embraced his wife, Judy. That’s because the committee voted 10-1 on Friday to advance a bill that would retroactively, as well as prospectively, repeal statutes of limitation on lawsuits by plaintiffs who claim they suffered child sexual abuse. Lorenz, who pushed to get this legislation passed for 15 years, suffered abuse as a teenager when he attended a private school in Kentucky.

 

 

The U.S. government took extraordinary steps Sunday to stop a potential banking crisis after the historic failure of Silicon Valley Bank, assuring all depositors at the failed institution that they could access all their money quickly, even as another major bank was shut down. The announcement came amid fears that the factors that caused the Santa Clara, California-based bank to fail could spread.