Business

The bulk of the Anne Arundel Economic Development Corporation’s work involves lending money to local businesses and helping them flourish. But, when the pandemic hit and federal and state money started funneling into the county, the quasi-governmental organization had an added mission: distributing funding to businesses most in need. AAEDC’s work delivering nearly $33 million in grants to businesses was critical in getting the county economy through the recession brought on by COVID-19 and keeping unemployment rates from skyrocketing, Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman said.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra on Tuesday appointed Mark C. Hanson, the former head of the San Francisco Orchestra and a leader one musician described as “a giant in the industry,” as its next president and CEO. Hanson, 48, who already has lead two orchestras larger than the BSO, will begin his new job April 21. He succeeds Peter Kjome, who announced his resignation as the BSO’s president and CEO in the spring of 2021. His contract expired at the end of January.

Medical cannabis has grown into a $600-million-a-year industry in Maryland since the first pre-rolled joint was sold legally in 2017, but Black Baltimoreans are largely left out. Baltimore, which is 62% Black, has 10 dispensaries. Some are locally owned. Others are owned by multistate corporations. None have majority Black ownership. And only one dispensary is located in a Black neighborhood. Now, Maryland is poised to legalize adult-use cannabis, meaning more dispensaries, more jobs and more money.

Rebecca Alban Hoffberger is tied to the train tracks in the old-timey photograph used as an invitation to the American Visionary Art Museum’s gala last fall. A locomotive belching black smoke and emblazoned with the word “retirement” is barreling down the tracks. The train’s cowcatcher resembles a set of giant metal teeth, as if Hoffberger’s retirement from the American Visionary Art Museum, which she incorporated 33 years ago, threatens to chomp her to bits.

A former silk mill dating back more than 100 years is under new ownership and renovation of the historic landmark is underway. Located on East Railroad Street in Lonaconing, the Klotz Throwing Company — sometimes written as Klots — opened in 1907, producing silk and rayon until it was closed in 1957 during a labor dispute. At its peak in the 1920s, the facility employed more than 300 peop The former mill in Allegany County was purchased in March by Brandon Sloan, a Lonaconing resident, from heirs of the late owner Herb Crawford. .

The short-staffed crab processing industry got some relief Thursday with the addition of 35,000 H-2B Visas expected by the second half of Fiscal Year 2022. The announcement by Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md.-1st, confirmed the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Labor approved the move to bolster the seafood industry.

A wind farm developer is funding an $11 million research initiative to measure how wind turbines built in the Atlantic Ocean will affect local and regional marine life. US Wind, the Baltimore-based subsidiary of Italian renewable energy firm Renexia SpA, is partnering with the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science to fund three research projects over the next 10 years focused on marine mammals, fish and birds. University scientists will analyze the animals in an 80,000-acre area located 13 miles off the coast of Ocean City that US Wind federally leased to build offshore wind turbines.