Politics

The White House is launching a formal partnership with 11 East Coast governors, including Gov. Larry Hogan, to boost the growing offshore wind industry, a key element of President Joe Biden’s plan for climate change. At a White House meeting on Thursday, Biden administration officials will meet with governors and labor leaders to announce commitments to expand important parts of the offshore industry, including manufacturing facilities, ports and workforce training and development.

Morgan State University in Baltimore could soon receive $2 million for its new artificial intelligence research center. Legislation that would direct the money toward the university advanced last night in the U.S. House of Representatives, in part due to the efforts of Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD), according to congressional staff. The funding was included in the Commerce, Justice, and Science and Related Agencies Appropriations bill for the fiscal year 2023, which was passed by a House Appropriations subcommittee and is set to go before the full committee for consideration, staff said.

Maryland State Comptroller Peter Franchot is among those calling on state and national leaders to temporarily suspend gas taxes. “We need to do something,” Franchot, who is running for governor, said at a Northwest Baltimore gas station Thursday. The state already had a 30-day gas tax “holiday” in March and April, suspending its 36 cents per gallon tax. The cost of gas is set to increase by 6 cents a gallon to adjust for inflation on July 1. “We need help,” Pastor Rodney Hudson said. “We need it now. Not tomorrow, because tomorrow’s too late.”

Gov. Larry Hogan is one of eight governors on a bipartisan work group that will study state-level solutions to gun violence and safety at schools, the National Governors Association said. Three other Republican governors, Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, Spencer Cox of Utah and Henry McMaster, are on the group with four Democratic governors, Phil Murphy of New Jersey, Kathy Hochul of New York, Ned Lamont of Connecticut, and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, the organization said.

President Biden’s call Wednesday for Congress and state legislatures to provide a temporary reprieve from gas taxes reignited a fight by policymakers in Annapolis about how to proceed. Congress appears unlikely to pass a holiday on the federal gas tax, while in Maryland legislative leaders continue to resist a call to go into special session — even though the state gas tax is due to increase by 6.6 cents at the end of next week, bringing it to almost 43 cents a gallon.

Baltimore’s spending board unanimously approved an agreement Wednesday with the state over the city’s troubled Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant — the state’s largest such facility. Under the consent order agreement, which was announced earlier this month, the city pledged to repay the Maryland Environmental Service for its emergency repair work at the facility and drop its legal challenge against the state’s takeover of the plant.

Three Republican hopefuls are running to unseat incumbent Anne Arundel County Sheriff Jim Fredericks in the July 19 primary. The incumbent Fredericks was elected in 2018 after edging then-Sheriff Ron Bateman in the primary. His opponents include Warren Porter, a 10-year veteran of the sheriff’s office; Joe Delimater, a deacon and electrical worker; and James McNeill, a former Annapolis Police officer.