Commentary

Last month, Baltimore Mayor Scott released the Squeegee Collaborative Working Action Plan, designating six pilot zones where a city ordinance prohibiting panhandling and solicitation activity would be enforced, effectively banning the practice of washing windows for money on city streets in those areas. Some hailed the plan as a good compromise in a bad situation. But it is deeply flawed and merely kicks the proverbial can down the road, as well as makes the squeegee workers accidents waiting to happen. Among its biggest flaws is the plan’s failure to address what occurs in the remaining intersections. It is grossly irresponsible for the mayor and City Council to allow youths, as the plan acknowledges, to “dart across high traffic intersections washing windshields to earn money” in any scenario.

What do we do about PFAS? There seems little doubt that scientists will discover more of these “forever chemicals” during the testing of Maryland farmland and Chesapeake waters. What do we do when we find them? Can we destroy a “forever chemical”? The term is scary, suggesting a harmful substance so durable it can’t be washed away. PFAS are chemical compounds found in our homes, in the land where cows graze and where farmers grow our food, in the waterways where we harvest fish. PFAS are “biopersistent” and “bioaccumulative,” meaning they hang out and build up over time.

Recently, The Baltimore Banner and other local news outlets have reported extensively about speculators purchasing both vacant and occupied properties in Baltimore’s disinvested neighborhoods. The speculators failed to deliver on promises and plans to rehab the properties that could have helped to revitalize those neighborhoods. The condition of such properties was also at the center of reports about the deaths of three firefighters in a vacant house.

We live in stressful times that can lead to serious medical problems. Despite being a top spender on health care, the U.S. is an outlier on life expectancy, sitting in the bottom half of dozens of high-income nations. Alarmingly, the last two years saw the biggest U.S. life expectancy drop in a century, sinking to 76 years for Americans born in 2021 — the lowest life expectancy since 1996 and a drop from 79 years in 2019. This despite a global trend in increasing life expectancies.

In 2022, Maryland was determined to have the longest Emergency Room wait time in all 50 states. Maryland has sustained this low ranking since 2015 — years before the COVID pandemic began. According to recent data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Maryland patients spend an average (median) time of 228 minutes waiting in the ER. In fact, we are the only state with an average wait time greater than 200 minutes.

WNBA superstar Brittney Griner, arguably the highest-profile American hostage ever, is finally free. In a swap negotiated by President Biden’s administration, Russia has released Griner for arms dealer Viktor Bout, ending the basketball player’s nearly 300 days in captivity. But this is just the first step back toward normalcy for Griner — and the first step toward ending state hostage-taking, an issue Biden earlier this year declared a “national emergency.”