Commentary

As the emergence of Brood X approached, I built my armor. Yes, figuratively, but mental chain mail encumbers just the same. Let’s be clear, construction began 17 years ago when I nearly abandoned my running car because “ONE OF THEM IS IN HERE!” When a cicada landed on my cardigan during a company fire drill, I shed the sweater and ran down the street screaming. In front of EVERYONE.

At the end of May, Gov. Larry Hogan issued his last round of legislative decisions, vetoing more than 20 bills in total and letting hundreds of others go into effect without his signature, bringing to an end the state’s legislative work this year. It was a year like no other. The legislature held its full 90-day session in Annapolis during the pandemic and accomplished a great deal.

As we enter the peak season for getting out on the water, there is reason to celebrate. On Tuesday, Anne Arundel County accepted about a dozen bids for long-overdue renovations and expansion of services at Beverly Triton Nature Park in Edgewater, which when completed will include a Chesapeake Bay swimming beach. Then later this summer the boat ramp at Solley Cove Park is set to open, bringing the number of public ramps for boats on trailers in the county to four.

This weekend is the seventh annual Wear Orange weekend, when Americans come together to demand a future free from gun violence. We wear orange to honor those taken and wounded by guns and call for an end to this senseless violence. Wear Orange was started by Chicago youth to honor Hadiya Pendleton, who was killed one week after her high school band marched in President Obama’s second inaugural parade. After her death, her friends asked us to speak out and wear the color orange to raise awareness about gun violence.

“Did you see the piece Josh Kurtz wrote about lieutenant governor picks?” my husband Bruce asked the other day [“The Paradox of Finding a Candidate for Lt. Governor,” June 1]. I hadn’t. So, of course, I immediately picked up my phone. I grimaced when I saw an awful picture of myself with Ben Jealous, Jamie Raskin and Justin Fairfax at an event almost three years and many centuries ago. I told my husband chuckling that if Josh Kurtz was that focused on Justin Fairfax, I had a much better picture with him (tucked away) that I could have shared.

Even as local governments ponder how to shower tens of millions of dollars in American Rescue Plan assistance on distressed businesses, Maryland workers eligible for enhanced unemployment payments under the same federal legislation are getting word of an early end to that extra $300. Gov. Larry Hogan on Tuesday announced that the enhanced payments will stop on July 3 in Maryland and that work search requirements will be reinstated. Why?

Baltimore is a charming city with a proud past. Fort McHenry and the city’s railroad network were pivotal to the nation’s victories in the War of 1812 and the Civil War. The first gas streetlamp was illuminated in “Charm City,” and the first American telegram was sent to … you guessed it, Baltimore. But for all its successes, the city has been marred by endemic corruption and the long shadow of segregation.

Not to be outdone by San Francisco; Portland, Oregon, or several other contenders, Baltimore is now considering the nation’s most restrictive ban on facial recognition technology. Passed on May 27 by the City Council’s Committee on Public Safety and Government Operations, the proposed ordinance would not just prevent city government from acquiring facial recognition technology, but also ban most commercial uses, thereby cutting off city businesses, workers and residents from a wide range of beneficial applications.

There’s something awfully peculiar when a governor vetoes legislation that passed the General Assembly with just a handful of dissenting votes, as did the bill to provide more transparency in emergency procurements. And when he announces he’s allowing more than 400 bills to become law without his signature — including such benign measures as the establishment of a task force on oral health, which passed the legislature with just one dissenting vote among 188 lawmakers — it only seems stranger.