Politics

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin (D) got headlines this week that former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) could only envy. Manchin’s announcement that he wouldn’t run for reelection in 2024, all but guaranteeing that Republicans will pick up his seat — and move that much closer to grabbing control of the chamber in the next Congress — was national news.

As critics of the Biden administration’s decision to award a new FBI headquarters project to Maryland attacked the process, state and local officials said the prize was long overdue for Prince George’s County, a wealthy Black enclave whose leaders have long sought to secure parity with neighbors in the Washington metropolitan region.

The Baltimore County Board of Elections has opened its consolidated headquarters in Owings Mills, where voters will be able to cast ballots early and the county agency can store voting equipment and train election judges. The county entered into an agreement with St. John’s Properties last month to lease a 45,000-square foot building at 5 Crossing Way, paying $654,240 a year for a 15-year lease, according to county spokesperson Erica Palmisano.

A coalition of local unions and advocacy groups debuted a proposal Wednesday that could force the Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland Medical Center and other nonprofit institutions in Baltimore to cough up more money for the city, additional revenues that would be earmarked for community programs like land trusts, urban farms and grassroots financial institutions.

An Instagram post on Mayor Brandon Scott’s page seeking volunteers for the Baltimore Commission for Women immediately piqued the interest of Kionne T. Abdul-Malik. “I saw the post right at the same time that I felt the urging to do more community work within the city. I applied and went through the process and was selected to serve,” the 44-year-old Ten Hills resident said.=

As Marylanders took to the polls Tuesday for local elections, voters in the liberal communities of Greenbelt and Rockville drew different conclusions about whether noncitizens also should be allowed to vote. In Greenbelt, preliminary results showed a decisive 67 percent of voters favored expanding ballot access for local elections, a first step toward the small city joining the growing number of suburban Maryland localities to embrace noncitizen voting in the most diverse state on the East Coast, which boasts a rising immigrant population.

Local lawmakers passed a bill Tuesday aimed at enhancing participation of minority-owned and small businesses among tow truck companies used by the Prince George’s County Police, marking another attempt by the County Council to deliver on a promise to increase opportunities for local minority businesses.
The new rules recommend that 51 percent of department money budgeted for towing annually be spent with minority-owned and small businesses in Prince George’s County, and require that at least 29 percent of towing funds be spent with these vendors.