Carroll commissioners get updates on projects funded by $32 million of federal pandemic money

The Board of Carroll County Commissioners got an update from staff last week on how the county’s allocation of federal COVID-19 pandemic funds are being spent. The federal government’s Coronavirus Local Fiscal Recovery Fund has provided $19.53 billion in support to local governments across the country. Carroll County’s grants manager Debby Sandiford reminded commissioners that the county’s allocation was just over $32.7 million, all of which has been allocated to various projects. The county has spent or obligated about $12 million of those funds. The deadline to obligate the money is the end of 2024, Sandiford said, and the deadline to spend the money is the end of 2026.

Annapolis City Council brings anti-addiction nonprofit to the Stanton Community Center

The Annapolis City Council settled a prolonged dispute between a community activist and a major Anne Arundel County nonprofit Monday night by taking away city-owned office space from a third group and awarding it to the activist. Shirley Gordon, founder of the community support services Street Angels Project, will be returning to Stanton Community Center, but she said the pyrrhic victory comes only after she made repeated public information requests and threatened to sue the city for civil rights violations.

For the first time, Southern Maryland’s transit dreams are showing signs of life

When Bloomberg reported in 2019 that Southern Maryland residents endure the most grueling commutes in the nation, the news raised few eyebrows in the tri-county region. Workers in Charles, Calvert and St. Mary’s are accustomed to waking in the wee hours to begin a long slog up Routes 301 and 5 to reach job sites in Prince George’s, Washington, D.C. and Northern Virginia. Transportation experts have spent decades looking at the feasibility of building a transit line to serve Southern Maryland, but projects in other parts of the state always loomed larger in the eyes of policymakers.

Charisma fueled Wes Moore’s primary win. Now he sharpens his focus on policy.

Talk to most top Democratic officials in Maryland about Wes Moore, and many are almost giddy about what the future could hold if the state elects a Democratic governor for the first time in eight years. Big investments in transit and clean energy. Fully funding and implementing a multibillion-dollar plan to reform public education. Ensuring residents have health care, housing and good-paying jobs, women have access to abortions, and communities are cleansed of violent crime. Moore, 43, is heavily favored to win in the deep-blue state, which would return Annapolis to the one-party dominance Democrats enjoyed for most of the past 50 years.

Eastern Shore congressional candidates to meet for televised debate

Three candidates vying to represent the Eastern Shore in Congress will meet for a televised debate in late October. Cecil Public Media announced the event featuring Rep. Andy Harris (R), former Del. Heather Mizeur (D) and Libertarian Daniel Thibeault late on Friday evening. The candidates were each confirmed for the forum after Harris earlier backed out of the proposed event, citing a concern that Thibeault wasn’t included. Maryland Matters wrote about the cancellation earlier this week, which Mizeur cast as part of a trend by Harris to avoid other high-profile events as well, including a televised debate proposed by the Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce and the Greater Salisbury Committee.

After ‘Serial,’ thousands continue to ardently follow the case of Adnan Syed

Melissa Binkley first learned of Hae Min Lee’s killing from local news media, shortly after the 18-year-old’s body was found in Baltimore’s Leakin Park in 1999. The Lancaster County resident was struck by the tragic details — the conviction of her ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed for her murder, a grieving high school — but didn’t delve into the case herself until years later, when she first saw Sarah Koenig discussing her podcast “Serial” on television. “I thought, ‘Podcast? What’s a podcast?’ ” she remembered. “And then it just exploded.” The 2014 blockbuster of a podcast, when the medium was still novel, made Lee, Syed and Koenig herself household names.

As Cox seeks to block early counting, officials say they expect massive mail-in vote

Lawyers for Republican gubernatorial nominee Dan Cox, in asking a Montgomery County Circuit Court judge to block a request to allow early counting of mail-in ballots, contend that state elections officials have failed to prove there is an emergency requiring court intervention. In the meantime, local election officials are warning that they expect to be deluged with mail-in votes for the November election and may need several days, if not weeks, to count them if they have to wait until after Election Day to begin. State elections officials had gone to court earlier this month to ask for permission to begin early counting what is expected to be a flood of mail-in ballots.

Despite layoffs, tech workers still have the upper hand. Here’s what they want.

Layoffs have been on the rise in the tech world for several months, but so have salaries for tech workers. It’s one of many disconnects in an intense battle for talent that continues to vex employers — particularly those companies on the hunt for workers with tech skills. “The hiring climate this year has been full of contradictions and challenges,” said Josh Brenner, CEO of Hired Inc. “We’ve seen climbing salaries, aggressive hiring, and layoffs — all at once.” Hired, a San Francisco-based job matching platform, recently analyzed more than 907,000 job interview requests and conducted a survey of more than 2,000 tech workers to spotlight changing dynamics in the recruitment arena.

Maryland is likely to legalize recreational cannabis this November. This group is leaving nothing to chance.

Maryland voters are expected to overwhelmingly support a ballot measure this November that would legalize adult-use cannabis, but a political group isn’t leaving anything to chance. MD Can ‘22 is a political committee formed in May to advocate for the passage of the adult-use cannabis ballot question. It is bankrolled almost entirely by a $50,000 donation from Trulieve, a cannabis company with dispensaries in eight states, including three in Maryland — in Halethorpe, Timonium and Rockville.

Baron: New election, same problems in Maryland

In the classic movie “Groundhog Day,” a TV weatherman played by Bill Murray gets stuck in a time loop, reliving Feb. 2 again and again. It’s a fitting metaphor for what Marylanders have experienced for years, as politicians from both parties have rolled out one plan after another to improve education, lift wages and help struggling families get ahead. Decades later, the needle has barely moved on these issues — in Maryland or nationally. In this election year, we have an opportunity to change our approach. Let’s finally do it.