Taylor DeVille
435 stories by Taylor DeVille
- Baltimore County wants community input on a new 22-acre waterfront park and community center dubbed the Sparrows Point Park that officials say will fill a “longstanding recreational gap” in the Edgemere and Sparrows Point communities.
- High-end automaker BMW is relocating its vehicle distribution center from the Port of Baltimore in Dundalk to Tradepoint Atlantic, scaling up its capacity in Baltimore County’s burgeoning distribution hub.
- Saying there is a void in leadership in Maryland and across the U.S., former state superintendent of schools Nancy Grasmick is establishing The Dr. Nancy Grasmick Leadership Institute at Towson University this summer.
- A unidentified man is dead after a hit-and-run Friday evening, according to the Baltimore Fire Department.
- A new study from the National Institutes of Health shows 16.8 million people were undiagnosed with SARS-CoV-2 from January through July last year as the pandemic mounted — nearly 5 undiagnosed and asymptomatic cases for every positive coronavirus test in the U.S. in the first half of 2020.
- Shake Shack is set to open its doors in downtown Towson Saturday, the first eatery to come online at the Circle East redevelopment.
- An Administrative Law Judge has denied a developer’s plan to build 19 homes on a narrow residential street Catonsville, writing the development would impact the quality of life of residents there.
- Money is a problem for the Maryland State Fair and Agricultural Society, the nonprofit organization that manages the fair. The coronavirus pandemic canceled last year’s state fair and cost the society nearly 80% of its expected revenue.
- A Baltimore County effort to supply food banks and homeless shelters with produce grown at a Cockeysville agriculture center has wasted more than $1 million and yielded a fraction of the expected food, according to a report from the Baltimore County Office of the Inspector General.
- Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski Jr. announced another series of town halls seeking input on the county’s budget, this time in a virtual setting.
- To be eligible for assistance, one or more household residents must qualify for unemployment, demonstrate a risk of homelessness and have a household income at or below 80% of the area median income.
- The Baltimore County Council is set tonight to take up a bill that would set a three-term limit for council members through a charter amendment.
- Gov. Larry Hogan on Monday rejected a demand by congressional Democrats for a “course correction” on Maryland’s COVID-19 vaccination program and touted, during tours of two Baltimore-area vaccination sites and a vaccine lab, the state’s readiness to distribute an increased supply.
- An administrative law judge soon will decide whether to approve a 19-home subdivision proposed on a quiet Catonsville street that has neighbors concerned.
- Despite state orders limiting courtroom operations, Baltimore County courts are still scheduling hundreds of in-person hearings for low level, nonviolent offenses each week, and the Maryland Public Defenders Union says it’s putting county attorneys, judicial staff and the public at risk.
- House Speaker Adrienne A. Jones, University of Maryland, Baltimore County President Freeman Hrabowski III and local Baltimore County leaders will discuss their "their “successes, the barriers they have faced, and the path forward” during Baltimore County's Black History Month Conversation Series, starting Feb. 3.
- Through Baltimore County’s new BCAUSE program, Baltimore County Age-Friendly Upgrades for Seniors, older adults can get up to $4,500 in needed home repairs to enable them to age in place.
- Towson University alum Rear Admiral Susan Orsega has been tapped by President Joe Biden’s team to serve as the nation’s acting surgeon general, one of the first nurses to hold the position.
- Baltimore County has paid $375,000 to settle a religious discrimination lawsuit brought by a Milford Mill-based church after the county denied their plans to use a house on Old Court Road as a place of worship, and the U.S. Court of Appeals overturned a lower court’s decision to dismiss the case.
- Residents can now track Baltimore County’s vaccination progress through an online dashboard monitoring administered doses and other metrics.
- Joy Lepola-Stewart, who this month departed Fox 45 after 17 years of news reporting, has taken the helm as the new director of public affairs for the Baltimore County Police Department.
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The power of play: With costumes and crafts, Baltimore County parents find ways to keep kids engaged
Stuck at home with their kids during the pandemic, some Baltimore County parents are resorting to play therapy to keep their kids engaged and to enhance creativity. - The Greater Baltimore Medical Center Health Care system has administered more than 4,000 coronavirus vaccine doses to staff and seniors older than 74, and plans to begin vaccinating seniors between 65 and 74 on Feb. 1, its chief executive officer said.
- The Baltimore County coalition of the Maryland Lynching Memorial Project will hold a virtual forum on two racial terror lynchings in Baltimore County on Jan. 23.
- A Catonsville man has died after a multi-vehicle crash on I-95 in Halethorpe Tuesday afternoon, police said.
- Baltimore County will begin vaccinating teachers and some other school administrators this week, County Executive Johnny Olszewski, Jr. announced Tuesday.
- The Baltimore Ravens will give $500,000 to build a new “destination playground” at Owings Mills’ Northwest Regional Park.
- One year after Baltimore County’s deadliest year on record when 49 people were killed, homicides in 2020 dropped to 33 while the number of nonfatal shootings increased, according to police data.
- Former state delegate Steve Lafferty is leaving his post as Baltimore County’s first chief sustainability officer to direct the county’s planning department.
- Cody Mulligan, a Rosedale man who died as a result of injuries suffered in a stabbing earlier this month, is remembered as a good-humored, positive person who inspired others with his resilience.
- Saying there is inadequate oversight to combat possible fraud, waste and abuse within Baltimore County Public Schools, County Executive Johnny Olszewski, Jr. is pushing for a state bill that would empower the County Office of the Inspector General to act with discretionary oversight of the school system.
- Citing a lack of transparency and communication from Baltimore County Public Library leadership and seeking healthcare benefits for almost half of the library system’s workforce, library employees are trying to unionize.
- Local police reports from the Wilkens Precinct for late December and early January.
- Police and public safety news compiled from local police alerts for the Towson area from late December and early January.
- Baltimore County police say an Arbutus man has died after the driver of a car in which he was a passenger drove through a red light and struck a sports utility vehicle in Arbutus on Sunday night.
- A 21-year-old blind man has died after being stabbed outside his Rosedale home last Saturday, and prosecutors are seeking to charge his alleged attacker with murder, police say.
- Danita Tolson, chair for the undergraduate program for nursing at Coppin State University, has been tapped by Anthony Fugett to take over as branch president. Fugett, who led the county’s NAACP branch for 20 years, said he would continue to serve on the executive committee of the county NAACP branch in an advisory function.
- Baltimore County Board of Education members railed against a proposed capital plan during a Tuesday night meeting, decrying school officials’ removal of projects to replace the aging and increasingly overcrowded Dulaney and Towson high schools.
- Baltimore County Police said a man has died after he and another man were shot outside an Essex apartment and town home building Monday afternoon.
- For the second time in three years, Baltimore County Councilman Julian Jones will preside over the County Council as chairman.
- In separate initiatives, the Patapsco Heritage Greenway, Historical Society of Baltimore County and the Community College of Baltimore County are collecting oral histories from residents highlighting voting rights and civic participation.
- After students were denied cancellations amid campus closures during the fall semester, Towson University and the University of Maryland, College Park have reached agreements with Maryland Economic Development Corporation to void some student leases at the privately-managed on-campus residence halls in the spring.
- Del. Jay Jalisi has been ordered by a district court judge to pay more than $19,500 in back pay and damages to a former legislative aide who says he was never paid for the month he worked for the Baltimore County representative last year.
- Baltimore County received state support for a designation that will support a planned mixed-use project at the former Martin Aircraft plant that one county council member said could be a “game changer” for Middle River and the eastern part of the county.
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Baltimore County executive orders cap on food delivery app fees that restaurateurs say hurt business
Fees from third-party food delivery services will no longer be able to collect more than 15% in commission from restaurant orders in Baltimore County as part of an effort to improve business for local restaurant owners effected by the coronavirus pandemic. - The Clearing House, a family-owned consignment shop in Cockeysville that during its 40-year run raised more than $180,000 to help women and children in need, will be closing in February due to the financial toll of the coronavirus pandemic.
- In a new partnership with the American Cancer Society, Towson-based artist Will Brown is commissioning paintings of cancer survivors and victims, donating 10% of profits earned from each painting to the international organization.
- Towson and Catonsville crime log.
- A 68-year-old man was robbed at gunpoint while on an early morning walk in Catonsville, police say.
- A tenant at Lakeside Homes in Lansdowne is suing the public housing complex’s property management company for failing to address “dangerous conditions” in her apartment, the lawsuit alleges, while an attorney with Maryland Legal Aid says longstanding structural and public health issues are widespread across the property, and have been ongoing for years.