Around Maryland

Frederick County Public Schools needs to hire more than 130 special educators in the next five weeks to be fully staffed by the time classes resume — something district administrators acknowledge is unlikely.The shortage is most severe among special education instructional assistants (SEIAs), whom FCPS has been struggling to recruit and retain for months. At the June 22 meeting of the Frederick County Board of Education, the district staff reported 30 SEIA vacancies. On Wednesday, they reported 97 vacancies.

Thousands of Carroll County residents were without power Wednesday after a strong storm system blew through the area Tuesday afternoon and evening. The Maryland Department of Emergency Management's website showed 9,730 Carroll County customers without power midday Wednesday. According to BGE, as of 3 p.m., Wednesday, about 8,837 of its 59,959 power customers, or almost 15%, were without power. FirstEnergy showed about 700 customers without power, most of whom were in the Taneytown area.

Local school districts are spending a good bit of their summer recruiting new schoolteachers. It's a critical task as the nation faces teacher shortages that existed pre-coronavirus pandemic. It's a year-round conversation that takes place among top administrators: How to make sure there are enough teachers in the classroom come the first day of school.

Gov. Larry Hogan spent Friday in Harford County, visiting businesses in downtown Havre de Grace, including recipients of Project Restore grants, and saw the progress of the city’s living shoreline restoration project for the riverfront along Water Street. “It was good to have the governor see our living shoreline restoration project and the efforts we’re making to keep [Chesapeake Bay ]clean and to return the shoreline to what it looked like when Capt. John Smith sailed past in 1608,” said Havre de Grace City Council President Jim Ringsaker.

Before the first full-color images from the James Webb Space Telescope were released to the world Tuesday, and before President Biden proudly unveiled the Webb’s photo of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723, Joseph DePasquale sat for hours in his office in Baltimore, working tirelessly to get them ready. DePasquale, senior science visuals developer in the Office of Public Outreach at the Space Telescope Science Institute, located on the Johns Hopkins University’s Homewood campus, was part of a team tasked with processing the Webb’s first photos — turning them from data sets to color images.

Bruce Springsteen will take the stage next year at a renovated Baltimore Arena. The rock legend's 2023 tour includes a stop at the downtown Baltimore venue, according to a list of tour dates and venues unveiled Tuesday. Springsteen is scheduled to perform in Baltimore on April 7 as part of the international tour, which features 31 U.S. shows and appearances in Europe. The show will be the first for the upgraded arena, which is undergoing a major facelift led by Los Angeles-based Oak View Group. Officials gathered last month for a ceremonial groundbreaking on the $200 million project, which counts investors like NBA star Kevin Durant and the musician Pharrell Williams.

The clock is ticking for the Chesapeake Bay’s surrounding jurisdictions to meet a 2025 goal set under a federal lawsuit settlement to implement policies and practices for bringing the nation’s largest estuary back to health after decades of pollution. Last year, Maryland fell short in meeting federally set targets under the settlement for nitrogen and phosphorous, the two pollutants that have fueled algae blooms leading to low oxygen “dead zones” harmful to fish and other aquatic life, according to a June evaluation by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The crew on fishing vessel Southern Girl pulls one caged wire crab pot after another out of the Chesapeake Bay, only to find a scarcity of crustaceans big enough to sell. It frustrates and worries waterman Luke McFadden — and complete strangers, too. “I’m seeing a lot of empty nets this season man what’s going on?” one TikTok user said, commenting as they watched the 26-year-old McFadden stream his daily work to his more than 1 million followers on the video-sharing app.

Carroll County officials held a ceremony Tuesday morning to celebrate the opening of the first phase of the county’s newest park, Westminster Veterans Memorial Park on Crest Lane. The 33-acre park features a walking trail, playground, picnic pavilion and free play area, according to Carroll County Recreation & Parks Director Jeff Degitz. Many other county parks include dedicated sports fields that are often occupied with practices or games for organized sports. Free play areas allow for families and children in the neighborhood to use a large open space to kick a ball or fly a kite, Degitz explained.