Around Maryland

Parents, teachers and administrators of six Baltimore County schools selected a map of reconfigured school zones Wednesday to send to the Board of Education for final approval. Committee members narrowed down over a dozen maps covering the county’s northwest area over a three-month process before settling on one Wednesday.

Money for Interstate 81 was in the plans of multiple governors, the Washington County delegation to the Maryland General Assembly said thanks, and the state’s new transportation secretary acknowledged both the “partnership” with local officials and their safety concerns. Yet millions of dollars, $68 million to be exact, has been scheduled by the state Department of Transportation to be reduced on the project, designed to widen a 3.5 mile stretch of the highway.

Michael Owen Jr., the first Prince George’s County police officer to be charged with murder for actions taken in uniform, was found not guilty on all the counts he faced in the fatal shooting of a handcuffed man, including second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter. The case hinged upon whether Owen, who fatally shot 43-year-old William Green six times while the man had his hands cuffed behind his back, pulled the trigger in self-defense on the night of the Jan. 27, 2020, shooting.

Neighbors in south Baltimore are frustrated with recent carjackings and auto thefts and they have decided to fight back. Residents are installing license plate readers on certain streets. Three community associations worked together to get the devices. “Our team of volunteers know Baltimore Police Department is understaffed. Our volunteers know there have been over 10,000 cars stolen in our city this year,” Federal Hill Neighborhood Association spokesman Brad O’Brien said.

City officials have been given a proposal: If they can’t eliminate vagrancy problems in a public park, why not make the area private? Cumberland Historic Cemetery Organization President Ed Taylor Jr. on Tuesday asked the mayor and City Council to consider renting Cumberland’s George Washington Headquarters cabin at Riverside Park along Greene Street to the Cresap Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution for $1 per year.

It’s been a bumpy road getting students to and from school in Howard County, with the beginning of the school year riddled with bus driver shortages and route mishaps. Now, bus drivers employed by the district’s largest contractor, Zum, are trying to unionize. This morning, Howard County bus drivers employed by Zum Transportation Services joined members of United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 1994 to hold a rally ahead of their representation vote scheduled for next week.

Hundreds of residents of the Avenel community in Potomac rallied Monday night to fight the decision by Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission, or WSSC Water, to close the area’s equestrian center. The Avenel Equestrian Center is located on the 1,018-acre Avenel farm, which was developed into a residential community, golf course and equestrian facility, according to its website.