Around Maryland

On a recent day, a man in a red shirt came into the Pennsylvania Avenue branch of the Baltimore library system and thanked the workers for saving his life. “He got Narcan from the library,” said Donna Bruce, a peer recovery supervisor for the Enoch Pratt Free Library System. “He came in to say thanks. To the library. And then he went to work.” Narcan is a brand name for naloxone, a remedy for opioid overdoses, and Bruce, with a sigh of satisfaction, said it’s a measure of success for a program launched in December at the branch that has aided hundreds of people and families affected by substance use and mental health issues.

The Harford County Sheriff’s Office, Harford County Office of Drug Control Policy, Aberdeen Proving Ground Federal Credit Union and the Harford County Sheriff’s Foundation have joined together to create the CORE trailer (Community OutReach Effort). The CORE trailer is a mobile educational platform that allows county agencies to take drug use prevention messages, in the form of interactive scenario-based lessons, directly to middle- and high-school-age youth in the community. On Thursday, Harford County leaders took a tour of the new unit at the Harford County Sheriff’s Office Southern Precinct in Edgewood. Elementary school students in the Sheriff’s Office Pledge awareness program demonstrated the interactive educational tools available inside the CORE trailer.

Robyn Coller, 58, lives in a house in Charles Village without air conditioning. “It’s as hot inside as it is outside,” she said. This summer, that has meant many days over 90 degrees. “I’ve gotten kind of used to it,” she said. “But it’s horrible. It can be pretty bad.” On Tuesday, as temperatures soared to 96 degrees, Coller traveled to the Franciscan Center of Baltimore, a community outreach center and soup kitchen. She came for some food, she said. And once she felt the cool air of the fans, Coller said she felt better. The Franciscan Center is one of 11 cooling centers in Baltimore designated as spots to take refuge during Code Red days, when the heat index — a measure that combines air temperature and relative humidity — is forecast to be 105 degrees or higher.

Though none of the 219 monkeypox cases reported as of this week in Maryland were in Carroll County, the county’s health department is getting ready, if and when the virus arrives here, a health official said Wednesday. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, monkeypox is caused by infection with the monkeypox virus, which is part of the same family of viruses as the virus that causes smallpox. Monkeypox symptoms are similar to smallpox symptoms, but milder, and monkeypox is rarely fatal, the CDC stated.

In an effort to improve safety for students going to school, exterior cameras have been installed on 750 Anne Arundel County Public School buses to capture images of vehicles that pass while the bright red, flashing “stop” arm is extended. Howard County honing HoCo By Design to shape long-term development While it’s illegal and unsafe to pass a school bus while it is stopped for students, not enough violators are caught, Anne Arundel officials said Wednesday. So, enforcement is going digital effective Oct. 1. A warning period starts Aug. 29, the first day of school.

As teachers prepare for the new school year, they are buying school supplies and reaching deeper into their own pockets than ever before. “Surveys have shown that almost all teachers say they pay for supplies for their classrooms without getting reimbursed,” according to My eLearning World, a publication focused on educators. Nationwide, teachers will spend about $3 billion of their own money this year, My eLearning World reported. That is an average of $820 per teacher. “It’s not all at once, but it adds up throughout the school year,” said Karen Kraus, a science teacher at Wheaton High School, in Montgomery County, Maryland.