Around Maryland

A few hours before the Maryland State House went on lockdown Thursday, after someone phoned in a threat to Annapolis police, the Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on legislation to create a Center for Firearm Violence Prevention and Intervention. Senate Bill 475 is part of a package released in January by Gov. Wes Moore (D) and led by the legislature’s presiding officers. The center, to be housed within the Maryland Department of Health, would focus on a data-driven public health approach to prevent gun violence and on collaboration between state and local government agencies, hospitals and community-based violence intervention programs.

Maryland’s courts on Monday will resume covering the cost of private home detention for people charged with crimes in the state who can’t afford the service — reviving a program just weeks after shutting it down when money ran out. A federal coronavirus pandemic grant helped pay the roughly $450 per month cost of GPS monitors. The grant was expected to last through the end of the year, but the courts abruptly ended the program last month.

Allegany Museum has been named one of the country’s “Best Small Town Museums,” according to a USA Today 10Best poll. The pubication frequently conducts polls on “hidden gems” across America in a wide variety of categories. The USA Today recently released the top 10 list for small town museums, with Allegany Museum placing second behind the Museum of the Big Bend in Alpine, Texas.

The Washington County Health Department recently joined several downtown partnerships to expand essential health care services to Hagerstown city residents. Every second Tuesday each month, teams from the health department will offer HIV, Hep C and syphilis education and testing at the Community Care Network of Washington County’s event from 4 to 7 p.m. Walk in for these services at 122 N. Potomac St., Hagerstown.

A Frederick County work group’s final report to the County Council recommends changes to the current ordinance on data centers — including the creation of a floating zone — and establishing an upper limit on data center development. The work group, created in June by Frederick County Executive Jessica Fitzwater, issued its final report on Friday with recommendations and considerations for regulating the data center industry, often referred to as critical digital infrastructure, or CDI.

By about 5 p.m., on a fall evening in late November, Lt. Kevin Wittmer and his crew have already responded to 10 emergency calls. A few more will come in before 8 p.m. None of them involve fire. During the lull in the rush, Wittmer, a professional firefighter and medic at the Prince George’s County District Heights fire station, takes a swig out of a water bottle. He still has a majority of the shift to finish before he can drive home to the Eastern Shore, where he will spend the next three days off the clock. The county’s firefighters typically work about twice a week, 24 hours a shift.

Under a new proposal from Baltimore’s Department of Housing and Community Development, city-owned vacant homes could be sold for $1 — but only in certain neighborhoods, and if specific conditions are met. The proposal, scheduled to go before Baltimore’s spending board next week, is intended to simplify sale negotiations for city-owned vacant properties by setting fixed prices. It applies to vacant homes and lots in the city neighborhoods with the most “stressed” housing markets, featuring lower sales prices, and higher rates of foreclosure and vacancy.

Debate over the constitutionality of Maryland’s Child Victims Act, long argued in the legislature and, more recently, in legal filings, is set to take place in a courtroom for the first time this week. The landmark law allows people sexually abused as children to sue those responsible, no matter how much time has passed. It was enacted last spring, with abuse survivors championing the measure as a long-overdue avenue to hold perpetrators accountable on the victims’ timelines.