Around Maryland

The Carroll County Board of Education’s October meeting agenda includes an expected vote on changes to public participation at school board meetings and suggestions from the school system’s Family Life Advisory Committee on changes to middle school family life and human sexuality education to remove lessons about sexual orientation and gender identity. The board is set to meet from 5-8 p.m., Wednesday, at 125 N. Court St., Westminster. The meeting will be broadcast on the Carroll County Public Schools YouTube channel. At the meeting, the board could ratify changes to its Citizen Participation Policy.

The Board of Education of Harford County unanimously approved a revised public comment and public hearing policy at its meeting Monday evening. The revised Public Participation at Board Open Meetings or Public Hearings policy strengthens the board’s disciplinary conduct enforcement for unruly or disruptive meeting attendees. The board may have any person removed from an open session if the person’s behavior is disruptive to the session, and a speaker’s privilege may be terminated for defamatory or abusive remarks if, after being warned, the person persists.

The Maryland State Archives launched a new website on Indigenous Peoples’ Day Monday that allows students, residents and visitors to research Native American tribes and events in Maryland history. To highlight some of the offerings on the website, called Mayis, treaties, other government documents and art from the 1600s were displayed at the Archives office in Annapolis. The artifacts offered a window into life in 17th century Maryland, including how Native Americans and colonists established agreements to share land (which colonists subsequently broke), documents detailing how criminal cases were handled and how tribal members signed documents with their clan’s icon.

Did global oil companies know that fossil fuel use causes climate change while still trying to convince consumers otherwise? Attorneys representing Annapolis, Anne Arundel County and dozens of other states and municipalities believe they did, and think corporations should be on the hook to pay for mitigating the harms of warming oceans, rising temperatures and other environmental crises. The joint legal action by Annapolis and Anne Arundel, filed last year, took a major step forward last week when a judge ruled their cases should be tried in state court rather than before a federal bench.

As Maryland prepares to demolish the historic Nice/Middleton Bridge that connects the southern part of the state with Virginia over the Potomac River, bicycle advocates are seeking to delay those plans until the completion of an impact study. The bicycle advocacy groups, which include Potomac Heritage Trail Association, Dahlgren Railroad Heritage Association and Oxon Hill Bicycle and Trail Club, allege in a complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland that state agencies, including the Maryland Transportation Authority, violated state and federal environmental review laws by changing the project from its original conception and failing to study the impact of demolishing the bridge. The groups, who are asking for a temporary restraining order to halt the demolition, also allege that the authority lacks the power to destroy the bridge under environmental laws.