Around Maryland

The violent crime rate across 21 Maryland colleges and universities reached a nine-year high last year, driven by an increase in reports of aggravated assaults, according to a Baltimore Sun analysis. The violent crime rate grew 58% from 2014 to 2022, with a dip during pandemic years, according to the analysis of crime data the schools are required to report to the federal government.

Sarah Brooks had to do a double take when her son told her that the car was gone. One night in August, her 2013 Hyundai Sonata was stolen from the street in front of her house in Baltimore’s Frankford neighborhood. What’s unsettling, Brooks said, is that the thieves were bold and took her property even though she and her neighbors have camera systems.

Ashlyn Thompson’s father recently received an invitation to view the vibrant red, yellow and orange colors of fall. As a colorblind person, it’s something he’s never seen before. Montgomery Parks recently acquired special color-correcting glasses for color deficient visitors, and the agency did a test run last month that included Thompson’s dad.

The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development issued a new score report for the Housing Authority of the City of Annapolis, and the news is not good. HACA scored just 42 points on a scale of 100 and was labeled a “troubled” performer, according to a Public Housing Assessment System report issued Nov. 2.

A recent poll of Anne Arundel County residents listed crime and the state of the economy as the area’s most pressing challenges. Approximately 36% of the 586 county residents who responded to the survey conducted in the last week of October cited crime as a top concern, while 23% pointed to the state of the economy, including employment, cost of living and the business environment, as a major issue. The poll was conducted by Anne Arundel Community College and the Center for the Study of Local Issues.

Alex Haley’s bronze shoes were dry Thursday afternoon, safely above the 2-foot flood tide that slipped over the dinghy landing at City Dock in Annapolis. The statue of the Pulitzer Prize-winning author is an unofficial flood gauge in America’s capital of climate change, where rising seas pose a threat to the future of a historic seat of government. The city is embarking on a $90 million remake of its downtown waterfront to protect its most vulnerable neighborhoods.

On a warm Friday morning in early September, a small group of people gathered in Fells Point to do what some consider unthinkable: jump into the Baltimore harbor. With pool noodles and inner tubes in hand, 20 or so harbor advocates and researchers organized by Baltimore’s Waterfront Partnership leapt into the water from a pier at Bond Street Wharf.