Around Maryland

The city of Baltimore will seek to terminate its contractual relationship with the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, the mayor’s office announced Wednesday evening. BOPA is the organizer of some of the city’s largest events, including Artscape and the New Year’s Eve fireworks. In a letter to BOPA leadership, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott announced the city’s severing its ties with the organization based on its “current financial situation and operational challenges.”

In the future, Maryland consumers in Montgomery County could forget about plastic bags at the grocery store. Those will be banned — with some exceptions — if a new bill passes the council this week. Under the “Bring Your Own Bag” bill, if customers want a paper bag, they’ll pay 10 cents per bag — double the rate they now pay if they don’t opt to bring their own reusable bags to the store.

The Baltimore County Council is poised to pass a resolution opposing a proposed $424 million, 70-mile energy transmission line. The Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project would cut through Baltimore, Carroll and Frederick counties. All seven members of the council voiced support for the resolution during a public hearing Tuesday.

The state of Maryland has unleashed a team of computer experts and enthusiasts on a number of the state’s websites. The mission: to see if they could find weak spots in the state’s domains that end in “maryland.gov,” “us.md.gov” or “state.md.us.” “We found more than 40 vulnerabilities,” said Chris Krawiec, senior director of cyber resilience with the Maryland Department of Information Technology.

In the budding but expansive effort to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge, the Maryland Transportation Authority is looking to lease storage space at Tradepoint Atlantic for up to the next five years. The 2.7-acre space in Sparrows Point is needed “for storage needs related to the Key Bridge collapse,” according to the Maryland Board of Public Works, which is scheduled to vote on the proposal at its regular meeting Wednesday in Annapolis.

Maryland utility regulators want to overhaul the way the region’s electric grid operator ensures reliable service, saying the current process saddles customers with unfair and excessive rates. The Maryland Public Service Commission, a state agency that regulates public utilities, has asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to reform an auction process used by PJM Interconnection, the grid operator for the mid-Atlantic region.

The Salisbury Police Department (SPD) is celebrating a generous donation that will help ensure K9 units are safe in all weather. The Blue Heron Agility Association of Delaware (BHAD) is providing $4,000 to the department. Police say the money will help outfit two SPD vehicles with HOT-N-POP systems. “It gives me clarity in knowing that I can keep my partner safe, just like he keeps me safe,” said PFC Daniel Derasmo, a K9 handler for SPD.

Three Baltimore County Council members have proposed a resolution for Baltimore County to condemn a 70-mile power line project that they say will ruin farmland, seize private homes and lower property values. The Maryland Piedmont Reliability Project (MPRP) was first announced in December, when regional transmission operator PJM awarded a contract to the New Jersey-based Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG) for development.