Politics

Baltimore County Councilwoman Cathy Bevins said Tuesday that she is withdrawing a proposed bill that would have exempted waterfront restaurants and marinas from some environmental requirements, following criticism from residents and environmental advocates. The bill would have allowed restaurants and marinas in Chesapeake Bay Critical Areas in the county to add new structures up to the water’s edge, exempting them from laws requiring a vegetation buffer to separate certain developments from bodies of water.

Eight million dollars in state funding to help relocate witnesses and victims of crime in Baltimore over the past three years hasn’t been spent due to a bureaucratic standstill between the governor’s office and city prosecutors. The Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office, which receives hundreds of thousands of dollars from the state annually, in 2019 sought and received additional funding to assist victims and witnesses from the Governor’s Office of Crime Prevention, Youth, and Victim Services. The $2 million would more than double its existing budget for victims and witnesses, and was to be re-upped each year after being spent down.

Baltimore’s deputy mayor for community and economic development, who recently was suspended from his position, has resigned effective immediately. Ted Carter, a member of Mayor Brandon Scott’s executive team since early 2021, submitted his resignation Monday. Carter had been suspended for eight days due to a complaint lodged against him, according to sources not authorized to discuss a personnel matter.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican, bashed his own party, saying there is “no question” there are signs of authoritarianism in the GOP after President Joe Biden described the “Make America Great Again” movement as akin to “semi-fascism.” Hogan broke with other members of his party to criticize the GOP, saying there are obvious signs of growing authoritarianism — in stark contrast to other Republican figures’ denouncement of Biden’s recent comments.

Ben Wu, Montgomery County’s recently departed economic development chief, has announced he’s returning to Gov. Larry Hogan’s administration in a newly created role. In an announcement Wu planned to send to colleagues, he announced he started a new job this week to wrap up several of Hogan’s economic development initiatives in the waning years of the latter’s tenure.

One of Gov. Larry Hogan’s top policy priorities — a plan to relieve traffic snarls along the Capital Beltway and I-270 — got the green light Thursday from a key federal agency. “This is a major milestone for the most important transportation project for the National Capital Region in the last 50 years. With the Biden administration’s final approval, we are ready to move forward with this transformative project,” the term-limited executive said in a statement. The Federal Highway Administration issued its “record of decision,” the final step in the National Environmental Policy Act process that spanned more than four years, less than a month after federal officials told the state of Maryland that final action on the $7.6 billion project had been deferred indefinitely.