Political notes: City Council wants hearing on election issues, Raskin’s vegetarian option, Segal’s next delusion
The Baltimore City Council wants to meet with city and state elections officials to probe issues voters faced in casting ballots during the July 19 primary election. The council advanced on Monday a resolution to invite the city’s elections director, Armstead Jones, as well as leadership at the State Board of Elections, to a meeting to “detail the cause of voting irregularities during the 2022 primary election, potential impacts these irregularities had on election results, and solutions to ensure that such errors do not happen again.”
Baltimore City Council committee to hold hearing on ‘squeegee issue’
A Baltimore City Council committee will meet Wednesday afternoon with law enforcement agencies and members of Mayor Brandon Scott’s administration to hold a hearing on what city officials have dubbed the “squeegee issue.” The Public Safety and Government Operations Committee scheduled the hearing for 1 p.m. at City Hall. Squeegee workers, usually Black teens, are a mainstay of some of downtown Baltimore’s busiest street corners, offering to clean motorists’ windshields for a few bucks.
Small-business owners are already burned out. Many see trouble ahead.
Lithium ion batteries have a catch — flammability. This Md. company has an alternative.
Lithium ion batteries are found in many products, including cellphones and other portable electronics, as well as electric vehicles. The batteries, which use liquid electrolytes, have drawbacks, however. One of the biggest is their tendency to overheat, which can lead to fires. To address that problem, Beltsville-based Ion Storage Systems has developed a solid-state battery that uses nonflammable materials. The technology was created by Eric Wachsman, who founded the company in 2019 and serves as its executive chairman.
As Maryland monkeypox cases rise, Baltimore health officials say vaccine doses are very limited
Baltimore health officials said Tuesday they’re trying to get more monkeypox vaccines for city residents as cases rise across the state, but that demand is greater than the doses the city has available. The city health department has partnered with Chase Brexton Health Care, a Baltimore-area clinic, to distribute vaccines, but Health Commissioner Dr. Letitia Dzirasa said all appointments have been filled. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention allocated Maryland about 3,300 doses, with Baltimore initially receiving a total of 200. Chase Brexton Health Care has 75 doses, the city’s health department has 65 doses and will hold an additional 60 doses in reserve to give to people identified through contact tracing or connected to other cases.
‘The wheels can’t turn’: Baltimore poll worker sounds alarm over staff shortages during primary election
A Baltimore election judge who worked Tuesday’s primary said a severe staff shortage at his polling site nearly crippled the operation and could have even more dire consequences in November should in-person turnout increase. The poll worker, Zach Fichtler, said his site at Wolfe Street Academy in Upper Fells Point was short at least six workers, leaving just four first-time election judges to manage several different roles. He wound up filling in as chief judge, he said, when his group realized no one else would show up to lead them.
Opinion: Congress should act on legislation that helps Md.’s patients and life science economy
In the coming weeks, Congress has an opportunity to pass legislation that is intended to improve the lives of millions of patients. The time is at hand for Congress to renew the law creating the FDA prescription drug user fee program, known as “PDUFA.” The reauthorization of this law, which is referred to as PDUFA VII, will help ensure the continued funding of the FDA’s product review activities that enable the approval of the next generation of medicines. Chief among the Marylanders who stand to benefit from PDUFA VII are patients who need new treatments, as well as those employed in our state’s burgeoning life science sector who work at the FDA, biotechnology companies and government-supported labs.
Challenger Sam Cogen widens lead in Baltimore sheriff’s race
Sam Cogen, a former high-ranking deputy in the Baltimore City Sheriff’s Office, widened his lead Tuesday in the race to unseat three-decade incumbent John W. Anderson. Cogen had 36,097 votes, or 51.8% of the votes, in the Democratic primary as of Tuesday morning. Anderson had 33,624 votes, or 48.2%. While the two candidates raked in nearly the same number of votes during early voting and on primary election day, Cogen has secured significantly more support from those who sent mail-in ballots. Election officials continue to tally straggler mail-in ballots.
Louis Angelos seeks to invalidate changes his brother, mother made to terms of Baltimore Orioles owner Peter Angelos’ holding trust
Firing the latest salvo in the legal battle over the fortune of Peter Angelos, his younger son is asking a judge to invalidate changes that the Baltimore Orioles owner’s wife and his elder son made over control of the trust in which the team and other possessions have been placed. In a motion filed Monday in Baltimore County Circuit Court, Louis Angelos argues that his brother, John, the Orioles’ chairman and CEO, has gone against their ailing father’s desire that his two sons share equally in the decision-making and distribution of his vast holdings.
A gang of horses: Assateague visitors experience horses gone wild
The Badowski family had just sat down for dinner at their Assateague Island campsite in May when they spotted wild horses galloping in the distance. Within seconds, the horses had surrounded the family vacationing from Bel Air, seizing ears of corn still steaming from the grill, ripping open a bag of chips and nosing through their hastily abandoned dinner plates. “We could barely get out of our chairs in the time it took them to get to our campsite,” said mother Caitlin Badowski, 40.
