With the academic year in full swing, many public school districts in the Baltimore area are still working to address teacher vacancies, but the gaps are not nearly as large as in the past few years. Ranging from 171 vacancies in Baltimore City schools to zero in Harford County, the progress is measurable. School officials and teacher union leaders say state-mandated salary increases, apprenticeship programs and recruitment initiatives have helped several counties reduce vacancies.

A Baltimore County councilman is trying to change a new law that would let voters decide this fall whether to expand the council for the first time since 1956, arguing that it doesn’t provide voters with enough information to make a decision. Councilman Pat Young, a Catonsville Democrat, was the lone vote against a measure in June to hold a referendum on council expansion.

Health officials in Maryland said Wednesday they will open the state’s first high-intensity inpatient addiction treatment center in years for children and young people in Baltimore, reflecting grim data showing the state’s youngest residents are not immune from the opioid epidemic. In 2014, there were four teens from ages 13 to 17 who died in the state from overdoses, a number that rose to 19 in 2023.

 

Ronald Silver II died of hyperthermia, according to an external autopsy report by Maryland’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. The Baltimore City Department of Public Works employee was on the clock as a sanitation worker when he collapsed on a porch on a day in early August that had a heat index of 103. The heat index is what the temperature feels like when relative humidity is taken into account.

Rev. Dr. Alvin Hathaway Sr. remembers when Upton — the historically Black West Baltimore neighborhood and cultural epicenter known for treasured landmarks like the Royal Theater — was home to the Mitchells, a family of civil rights firebrands famously dubbed “The Black Kennedys.” Hathaway, born in 1951, was a youngster in the Mitchell family’s heyday and grew up with them as neighbors. Little George was his companion on the playground. (Photo: Baltimore Beat)

Americans in 2024 face a host of issues, but the cost of living is top of mind for many voters. Families are struggling to afford basic necessities and making difficult choices about what they can spend money on. Yet one issue may be the most important of all, especially to younger voters: the housing crisis. Cost-burdened renters hit a national record high in 2022 with over 50% of all renters spending more than 30% of their gross income on housing expenses — and 52% of Marylanders fall into this category.

Until last week, Joppatowne High School wasn’t especially well known outside Harford County. It is small, with fewer than 900 students, and serves a working-class, majority-minority community. Nearly three-quarters of students there are classified as economically disadvantaged. The most recent newsletter sent home by school administrators featured a warning to follow the county’s restrictions on student cellphones in school (they have to be deactivated during instruction time).

Who you consider the winner of the consequential first presidential debate between former president Donald Trump and current Vice President Kamala Harris is likely based on who you liked before the two even took the stage tonight in Philadelphia. But after watching the two spar on ABC, I would give the win to Harris, mostly because she managed not to tell wild bold-faced lies about her opponent’s positions, and because she maintained a silently strong visage that evoked Gen X’s favorite fictional lawyer and mother — “The Cosby Show”’s Clair Huxtable.

The Federal Reserve gets its last look this week at inflation readings before it will determine the size of a widely expected interest rate cut soon. On Wednesday, the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics will release its consumer price index report for August. A day later, the BLS issues its producer price index report, also for August, a measure used as a proxy for costs at the wholesale level.

Howard County saw a 7% increase in visitor spending in 2023 over the previous year, as the number of tourists finally met pre-pandemic levels, according to a report from the county’s tourism bureau through Tourism Economics, a data and research company. Visit Howard County reported that the number of tourists reached around 3 million people, with those visitors spending a total of $790.4 million last year, up nearly 20% from before the pandemic.