Around Maryland

As a grassroots, volunteer-based organization that connects home-schoolers across the state, the Maryland Homeschool Association has tracked data collected by the state education department on home-schooling rates for nearly 20 years. It always tended to fluctuate seemingly randomly, said founder Alessa Keener, never changing by more than 9%. “Some years, it goes down. Some years, it goes up,” she said. “There’s never really been, I think, a good explanation (as to) why.”

As spring approaches, Harford County remains at a low community level as the number of new cases and the testing positivity rate continue to decline, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. Harford County reported 113 new cases from Feb. 28 to March 7, a 23.13% decline over the previous week, according to CDC data. There were 18 new hospitalizations in the new seven-day reporting period, a 34% increase over the previous week. Also, the test positivity rate stood at 2.75, a 0.58% decline.

Baltimore Police Officers Keith Gladstone and Carmine Vignola arrived at fellow officer Robert Hankard’s house on a late March evening in 2014 in dire straits. The pair needed a toy gun. Fast. Another officer, Wayne Jenkins, had just run a man over in Northeast Baltimore. The man wasn’t in possession of drugs or a gun, and if Gladstone and Vignola didn’t help Jenkins plant evidence soon, there could be trouble, according to federal court filings.

Keith Davis Jr. asked a Baltimore judge to dismiss the charges against him ahead of a fifth murder trial because he argues they are the product of prejudice by State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby — a legal argument closely mirroring one the city prosecutor made in defense of her federal indictment. The timing of charges brought against Davis and statements made by Mosby and her prosecutors are evidence of “deep animus, prosecutorial misconduct, and vindictiveness” that tainted his criminal cases beyond reproach, Davis’ lawyer argued in a motion.

The Montgomery County Public Schools Board of Education voted unanimously Tuesday to drop the district’s mask mandate effective immediately for the school system of roughly 160,000 students. “This board would like to remind our community that the decision to wear or remove a mask is an individual and very personal one,” Montgomery County Board of Education President Brenda Wolff said ahead of the vote. Wolff called for community members to treat with respect teachers, staffers and students who may choose to continue to wear a mask.

One morning in late November 2019, a historic office building on Duke of Gloucester Street caught fire, consuming all three stories in flames. In the aftermath, Alderwoman Elly Tierney, a Democrat who represents the Historic District, introduced a bill requiring commercial property owners to install sprinkler systems in their buildings. Last week, the bill passed the City Council by an 8-1 vote. Tierney had withdrawn the bill at the start of the pandemic and reintroduced it in January.

Prince George’s County will let its COVID-19 state of emergency expire on Wednesday at 5 p.m., County Executive Angela Alsobrooks said. The county lifted its indoor mask mandate on Feb. 28. Since Feb. 7, the county has reported fewer than 100 new cases per day, Alsobrook’s office said. As of March 7, the positivity rate is 1.7%, and the weekly case rate per 100,000 residents is 28.37.

The director of Carroll County’s budget office told commissioners Tuesday that the financial outlook for the county is “remarkably better” than it was one year ago. The Board of Carroll County Commissioners got a look at plans for the fiscal 2023 operating budget Tuesday, as county staff prepares for the upcoming budget cycle. The county’s fiscal year begins July 1. Current revenue projections will set the stage for the commissioners’ budget discussions and decisions in the coming months.

All students were evacuated from the Carroll County Career and Technology Center in Westminster early Tuesday morning and were sent back to their home schools for the day following a minor fire inside the Culinary Arts program area of the building. There were no injuries and a school system spokesperson said it was too early to assess the damages to the school.