Around Maryland

The 4,000-seat event center at Maryland Live! Casino & Hotel will host thousands of Anne Arundel County Public Schools graduates next week, a long-awaited change that was to have started in 2020 but was delayed for two years due to the COVID pandemic. Schools spokesman Bob Mosier said the new venue has state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment and large screens throughout, which should be an asset for attendees.

Dulaney Valley Memorial Gardens hosts a Memorial Day ceremony every year to honor those who pay the ultimate price. The ceremony specifically honors those with ties to Maryland who lost their lives while serving the country.

The Food and Drug Administration said at least 12 hospitalizations are probably linked to strawberries sold in grocery stores including Trader Joe’s and Walmart.

The World Health Organization’s top monkeypox expert said she doesn’t expect the hundreds of cases reported to date to turn into another pandemic, but acknowledged there are still many unknowns about the disease, including how exactly it’s spreading and whether the suspension of mass smallpox immunization decades ago may somehow be speeding its transmission.

A high school in Prince George’s County was placed on lockdown for nearly two hours Thursday afternoon when police received a call that a student had brought a gun on campus. After searching Fairmont Heights High School, county police said, officers found parts of a “ghost gun” — typically purchased as a kit, and a weapon without a serial number — in a classroom. The student who allegedly brought the gun parts to school was arrested, police said.

The Episcopal Diocese of Maryland has awarded $175,000 in grants to six community groups in its first distributions from a historic $1 million reparations fund. The diocese announced Thursday that it will present grants of up to $30,000 to groups dedicated to “restoring African American and Black communities.” Three of the winners are based in Baltimore and three in other areas of the state.

Herself not a licensed engineer, D’Andrea Walker is bringing in personnel that lack qualifications, critics say. County Executive Johnny Olszewski expresses “full support” for his public works chief. Increasingly over the past year, turnover of senior staff at Baltimore County’s Department of Public Works and Transportation has been raising eyebrows – so much so that when asked about it, one county insider responded, “Oh, you mean the mass exodus?