In the summer evenings, after the air has cooled down, Alivia Blum, 18, walks her goats up the hill behind her family’s home in rural Baltimore County and back again. Afterward, she sits in their pen and feeds them hay and, as a treat, Cheez-Its. Trixie and Kitty are picky eaters, but they absolutely love Cheez-Its.
Students in Howard County head back to school on Monday while the school system continues to hire for some open teaching positions. Howard County Schools Superintendent Michael Martirano told C4 and Bryan Nehman on Thursday that the school system has done well when it comes to hiring for open teacher positions.
The Annapolis Planning Commission sent the developers of an affordable housing community back to the drawing board last week after requesting a near complete overhaul of the project. The board’s wide-ranging but at times vague criticisms frustrated the developers as well as area housing advocates, who worry that further delays could jeopardize the project and discourage other developers from building income-restricted housing in Annapolis.
In episode 37 of The Lobby, Damian comes to you live from the biggest lobby in Maryland, the MACo Summer Conference in beautiful Ocean City. This is part 3 of a multi-part series with leaders from around Maryland at the biggest gathering of elected officials and insiders in the state.
The seven-member Frederick County Council is divided about whether to amend the Sugarloaf Mountain preservation plan to appease the mountain’s owner. Stronghold, the owner, has requested that the county remove the organization’s land from a proposed overlay zoning district meant to govern and restrict development. Its board members decided they will close the mountain to the public if the County Council approves a plan that Stronghold opposes.
The Johns Hopkins University police force is moving to the fore again. The Baltimore university pledged in 2020 to halt the hotly-contested creation of a private police force following the police killing of George Floyd and the nationwide Black Lives Matter protests that ensued. Hopkins came under fire a year later when it announced the hiring of Branville Bard Jr. to lead the department. The announcement came at a time when most students were not on campus.
As the start of the school year approaches, Anne Arundel County Public Schools is short 300 teachers, 67 bus drivers, 222 food service workers, 81 custodians and 57 crossing guards. School staff provided an update to the Board of Education on Wednesday afternoon, saying the system will serve 84,000 children across 125 school facilities when classes start Monday.
Baltimore will spend nearly $1 million to update a cellphone tracking technology that police use to collect select data from phones and that has been the subject of litigation. The $920,000 purchase from Cognyte Software will upgrade the city’s stingray technology, which works by mimicking a cellphone tower and tricking all phones within a range of up to a mile to connect with it. The suitcase-sized device allows police to record a phone’s location and number as well as the numbers of outgoing calls and texts.
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan on Wednesday announced the state would provide $503,000 in investments to fund the Little Italy community in Baltimore City to help make the neighborhood safe. Hogan, along with Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson and community leaders, were in Little Italy for the announcement. “Little Italy is a proud community with a storied history, but violent crime threatens to make it less safe and welcoming.
Frederick County Board of Education member Jay Mason said Wednesday that he was set to start as a fifth grade teacher in Montgomery County Public Schools after failing to gain traction on a request to teach locally. The school board’s ethics policy says board members cannot work for Frederick County Public Schools for at least one year following their departure from the board.
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