Sheilah Kast

Somerset County, the southernmost county on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, was founded in 1666.

It’s motto for centuries has been Semper Eadem, Latin for “Always the same.”

A lot has indeed stayed the same, but even at the bottom tip of Maryland, the normal processes of time and struggles to bring about change intentionally…have had effects also.  

 

In 2006, a group of residents in Baltimore’s Curtis Bay neighborhood had a problem: prostitutes stood on street corners waiting for Johns; they’d be picked up for prostitution by the police, only to return to the same streets. A task force was formed. What grew out of it was a program rooted in an approach called “problem-solving justice”. Instead of moving those facing prostitution charges through the criminal justice system, it gives  them access to services that might keep them out of it and off the streets. It's called the Specialized Pre-Trial Diversion program. It began in 2009, within the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office, and can now serve about 80 people at any given time.

Mary Ellen Barbera was a public school teacher in Baltimore when she began taking night law school classes at the University of Maryland. About 30 years ago, she graduated from law school, passed the Maryland bar, and began down a path that would lead her to Maryland’s highest court, the Court of Appeals. A year ago this month, she became that court’s first female Chief Judge. She joins Sheilah to talk about her first year in that role.

Reuters news agency published its analysis last week of coastal flooding along the Eastern Seaboard.   They tracked the average number of days several East Coast cities were above flood thresholds. 

Around the state, “For Sale” banners are going up, signs are being staked into front yards and open houses are taking place every weekend.  All that’s typical for this time of year, but what’s the current situation for buyers and sellers?

To catch us up on how the greater Baltimore housing market is doing is Andrew Strauch, Vice President of the Metropolitan Regional Information Systems (MRIS), which compiles data on residential real estate. Sheilah talks with him about it.

It was just about this time on this date in 1877 that the first national strike started, and it started in Baltimore. Two dozen locomotive firemen employed by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, refused to man the trains at Camden Yard, Mount Clare and Riverside Stations. Within hours the work stoppage had spread to Martinsburg, West Virginia, then to other states. Within a week, almost half the U.S. Army was deployed against more than 100,000 strikers. Before the strike collapsed two weeks later, ten citizens had been killed in Baltimore alone.

A little less than two years ago, Sparrows Point was bought by liquidator Hilco Global. The site, once home to one of the largest steel mills in the world, could change hands soon once again. What challenges would the new owners face? And, how might Sparrows Point find life once again?

It’s Bastille Day, the 225th anniversary of the Parisian mob taking over the fortress-prison that stood for royal absolutism. What better day to hear about how five émigrés from that revolution went on to have a big impact on the United States of America?

While many kids fill their summer days running, playing and swimming, there are thousands of kids in Maryland who find themselves distracted by their hunger.  For the most part, the kids who are hungry in the summer are the ones who received free or reduced-price breakfast and lunch during the school year.

While in school some kids can get three meals a day, but this summer, for the first time, only two meals a day. What are the barriers to feeding these children and how does summer nutrition loss affect a student’s achievement when school starts?

  Kathleen Brockway’s new book has a grand title, Baltimore’s Deaf Heritage, but it feels like family album. Brockway has done both: given us an overview of a deaf community organizing and fighting for new rights as well as an intimate profile of families who led that community.