Around Maryland

After multiple discussions spanning several months, the Frederick County Board of Education has determined it would be impossible to expand school bus service in the fiscal 2024 budget, its vice president said. Board Vice President Dean Rose said in an interview last week that he wasn’t giving up on the overall idea, though.

While race, sexual orientation and religion are the most likely sources of bias incidents in the state, almost three-quarters of the verified events from the 2021 Maryland Hate Bias Report were based on race, with 61 of the 101 statewide verified incidents being anti-Black or anti-African American. The next most likely group to be targeted in Maryland was gay males with 11 incidents.

When parents of Carroll Manor Elementary School learned their kids could be redistricted to a different middle school — one they said would split up their community in northeastern Baltimore County — they took action. They organized and created a website, shirts and signs to make clear that sending their children to Pine Grove Middle School in Carney was a nonstarter. They wanted their children to go to middle school with students from Jacksonville Elementary, feeding into Cockeysville or Ridgely middle.

In a closed work session Tuesday, the mayor and City Council reportedly received legal advice for the Rolling Mill project. Under the Maryland Open Meetings Act, government officials may close a meeting according to certain statutory exceptions, such as to gain expertise from their lawyer, in which case the reason that permits the private session must be disclosed to the public.

Two years after becoming sober, Westminster resident Kirstin Haga now helps others deal with the effects of substance abuse. “I never would have believed that’s where I would be,” said Haga, 29, a medical office coordinator at Nimel Mental Health, which serves clients throughout the Baltimore-Washington region. “But I relate to it. … It’s not just a job.” On Thursday, Haga and eight classmates officially graduated from Carroll County’s Adult Drug Treatment Court in a ceremony at Carroll Community College in Westminster.

A federal grand jury indicted Frederick County Sheriff Chuck Jenkins, 66, of Thurmont, and Robert Justin Krop, 36, of Frederick on Wednesday on charges of conspiring and making false statements to illegally acquire machine guns. The Frederick News-Post consulted a firearms attorney and reviewed firearms laws to more closely examine the charges against Jenkins and Krop.

For 50 years, the Worcester County Developmental Center (WCDC) has helped local people with intellectual disabilities find meaningful employment, gain independence, and increase their self-worth. WCDC’s headquarters is in Newark, and the center also operates seven group homes in Ocean Pines. Executive Director Jack Ferry is an Ocean Pines homeowner. Ferry said the center first opened in September 1973.