Around Maryland

Earlier this month, the Baltimore County Council awarded nearly $2.6 million in operating grants to dozens of cultural organizations located outside its boundaries, including the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and Everyman Theatre. That’s nearly five times the operating funds that have been promised to the arts, science and nature-based groups who make Baltimore County their home, according to an analysis of budget data by The Baltimore Sun.

The Maryland Department of Transportation has received its first credit rating upgrade in nearly 15 years, which Secretary Paul Wiedefeld said will lower borrowing costs and save taxpayers money. The department, though, also received a negative outlook to match the state’s forecast, indicating that its credit rating may be downgraded in the near future. Maryland’s general operating budget, similar to its transportation plan, is facing projections of a multibillion deficit in the coming years.

The Federal Reserve announced a 0.5% rate cut, the first reduction since 2020. Mortgage rates could drop as a result for prospective sellers, buyers, and refinancers. Marco Smith, from the Maryland and Delaware group of eXp Realty, said this cut will cause a rippling effect in the housing market. “We will see the interest rates follow that pattern because there have been a lot of buyers on the sideline and any movement of rates, in a positive direction is going to bring people off the sideline.”

The Frederick County Board of Education has accepted two bids from local farms to serve fresh produce throughout Frederick County Public Schools. The board on Sept. 11 accepted bids from Moon Valley Farm near Woodsboro and Catoctin Mountain Orchard near Thurmont. The bids are priced per purchasing unit, which varies among fruits and vegetables.

Another Baltimore County post office is slated to close. The Glen Arm Post Office in northeast Baltimore County will suspend service at the close of business on Oct. 4 due to the lease expiring the next day, the U.S. Postal Service told 11 News in a statement. On Oct. 5, retail and post office box service will transfer to the Baldwin Post Office located 3.2 miles away at 13516 Long Green Pike.

A historic marker was put up in Montgomery County, Maryland, to tell the story of a Black neighborhood that was shut down before it was ever built. In 1906, four men bought dozens of acres of land off Wisconsin Avenue. It was going to be an upscale Black neighborhood called Belmont, rivaling Chevy Chase. The planned Belmont neighborhood would have stretched from Wisconsin Avenue at the Friendship Heights Metro Station to Oliver Street.

Montgomery County Public Schools is providing new guidance over how administrators should respond to hateful acts involving its students, reserving contacting police for only the most serious incidents. The school system — Maryland’s largest with over 160,000 students — will now have a “tiered” response system, with the most egregious or violent acts designated as a “level red,” according to the district’s website.

Mayor Brandon Scott’s office called Thursday for an “independent forensic audit” of the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, and pledged to withhold for now a requested cash infusion of $1.8 million — casting doubt on the future of the besieged event-planning agency. “The picture presented by BOPA at this afternoon’s board meeting is deeply troubling and raises more questions than it answers,” a spokesman for the mayor wrote in a prepared statement.

Baltimore’s lawsuit against opioid distributors is “the biggest and most important case in the history of this city,” offering a chance to hold drug companies accountable for the hundreds of millions of painkillers they shipped into the metro area and the addiction and overdose crisis that followed, a city attorney told jurors Wednesday.