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Baltimore

In Maryland, Cracking Down On A Crime Wave That Doesn’t Exist

March 6, 2025 Jon Jeter, Black Agenda Report. , , , , ,
Here in this deep blue state, a coalition of judges, attorneys, youth advocates, civil liberties and racial justice organizations are trying to persuade Maryland lawmakers to amend Draconian legislation that requires prosecutors to charge children as young as 10 in adult criminal court for a wide range of felony offenses. At issue is Senate Bill 422 , which, if passed by Maryland’s General Assembly in this legislative session, would reduce by nearly two-thirds the 33 criminal offenses for which juveniles in Maryland are automatically charged as adults.

How Common Ground Cafe Workers Won A Union And A Cafe

February 28, 2025 Bernadette King Fitzsimons, EWOC. , , , ,
In December 2022, workers at Common Ground Cafe in Baltimore started to talk about forming a union. They wanted to address issues of pay equity and workplace discrimination, among others. They hoped their boss would be open to working with them to improve the cafe, which had been a mainstay in Baltimore’s Hampden neighborhood for over 20 years. Instead, when the boss found out about their union drive in July 2023, he closed the business with less than 12 hours’ notice. Nik Koski, a Common Ground worker involved in the union campaign, was completely shocked: “We prepare ourselves for the different ways a boss might retaliate, but to actually experience it was something else.”

Baltimore Media Create A False Impression That Youth Are Responsible For A Lot Of Very Dangerous Crime

January 9, 2025 Janine Jackson, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. , , , , ,
Some listeners may know the Sentencing Project for their work calling out racial disparities in sentencing associated with crack versus powder cocaine, and mandatory minimums. A recent project involves looking into another factor shaping public understanding and public policy around criminal justice—the news media. In this case, the focus is young people. “The Real Cost of ‘Bad News’: How Misinformation Is Undermining Youth Justice Policy in Baltimore” has just been released. We’re joined now by the report’s author. Richard Mendel is senior research fellow for youth justice at the Sentencing Project. He joins us now by phone from Prague.

In Baltimore, Urban Farming Isn’t Just About Growing Food

January 3, 2025 Jennifer Goold, Next City. , , , ,
Urban farming is often heralded as a practical solution to food deserts, providing fresh produce to communities where unjust urban planning and policy have limited access to nutritious options. But urban farms can also sow seeds that grow far beyond the garden beds. In Baltimore’s Curtis Bay neighborhood, Filbert Street Garden is showing the power of community-led transformation. Once an overgrown lot, it has evolved into a vibrant community hub, thanks to the dedication of Black farmers like Brittany Coverdale, whose passion for racial and environmental justice led her to the garden coordinator role at Filbert Street Garden.

Baltimore Is Setting A National Standard For Diversifying Its Economy

November 8, 2024 Ilana Preuss, Next City. , , , ,
One of the crucial economic lessons of the Covid-19 pandemic is the importance of diversifying local economies, even in America’s largest cities. New York City continues to struggle with an economy too heavily reliant on tourists and commuters; Las Vegas saw its entertainment industry shut down when out-of-state visitors stopped traveling; vacant storefronts are prominently visible in major business districts and on main streets nationwide. Diversifying often implies attracting new industries by luring them from elsewhere – often a zero-sum game, if the industries are simply shifting locations within the United States.

The Baristas Who Took Over Their Café

September 15, 2024 Osita Nwanevu, In These Times. , , ,
In July 2023, early morning visitors to Baltimore’s Common Ground coffee shop found a sign taped to the door⁠. With a thank you to the Hampden community that had sustained it for 25 years, owner Michael Krupp announced the shop would be ceasing operations ​“effective immediately.” Common Ground employees released a statement saying they had only been notified themselves the previous afternoon and, notably, had been a few months into forming a union. According to Common Ground barista Nic Koski, the effort was sparked by ​“general workplace concerns in terms of people wanting more fair, equitable wages, especially between in front of house and back of house, and better treatment — wanting to look into health care and benefits.”

Baltimore Lawsuit Alleges Shale Investments Fueled Price Fixing Scheme

August 27, 2024 Sharon Kelly, DeSmog. , , , , , ,
The city of Baltimore filed a class action lawsuit on Saturday, alleging that major U.S. shale drillers colluded to fix oil prices, the latest in a series of lawsuits filed this year claiming that U.S. oil producers conspired with each other and with OPEC to drive oil prices up. The new lawsuit, filed by the mayor of Baltimore and its city council, is notable in part because it alleges Wall Street investment firms played a role by pressuring shale drillers to coordinate their output to prevent fueling price wars with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and other oil producers abroad. Wall Street companies were among the largest investors in multiple competing shale producers at the same time — and pushed them all to engage in “capital discipline,” the lawsuit alleges.

The Dali Disaster Is What Profit-Driven Economics Looks Like

April 4, 2024 Bob Hennelly, Work Bites. , , ,
On March 26, the day after the commemoration of the 113th anniversary of the Triangle factory fire that killed 146 mostly female immigrant garment workers in lower Manhattan — a crew of a half-dozen immigrant men in a non-union paving crew fell 185 feet to their deaths from Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key bridge after it was rammed by the Dali, a rudderless massive cargo ship that was trying to leave the port without a tug escort. Police were able to close the bridge to traffic just before the catastrophic collision took place after the powerless and adrift Singaporean-flagged Dali got out a mayday call at 1:30 a.m. on Tuesday.

Feds Recently Hit Maersk In Baltimore Disaster For Silencing Whistleblowers

March 28, 2024 David Sirota, The Lever. , , , , , ,
The company that chartered the cargo ship that destroyed the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore was recently sanctioned by regulators for blocking its employees from directly reporting safety concerns to the U.S. Coast Guard — in violation of a seaman whistleblower protection law, according to regulatory filings reviewed by The Lever. Eight months before a Maersk Line Limited-chartered cargo ship crashed into the Baltimore bridge, likely killing six people and injuring others, the Labor Department sanctioned the shipping conglomerate for retaliating against an employee who reported unsafe working conditions aboard a Maersk-operated boat.

Baltimore’s New $1 Billion Jail Will Be Most Expensive State-Funded Project

March 27, 2024 Ben Conarck and Pamela Wood, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
Nearly nine years after former Gov. Larry Hogan shuttered the old Baltimore City Detention Center, a new centerpiece facility for the city’s pretrial jail population is poised to rise from its ashes. But it’s going to cost you. The Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, which has run the city’s jail system for decades, is pushing ahead with ambitious plans for the Baltimore Therapeutic Treatment Center — a sort of hybrid jail, hospital and mental health and substance use treatment facility for people facing criminal charges.

Baltimore: Cops Tried To Arrest A Whole Neighborhood

March 24, 2024 Taya Graham and Stephen Janis, The Real News. , , ,
Former Baltimore Police Sgt. Ethan Newberg’s disgraceful downfall continues as new body camera footage reveals an incident in which the ex-cop made three illegal arrests, and then threatened to arrest entire block full of witnesses. Although they were initially responding to a neighborhood dispute, Newberg and his partner arrested a local resident who was not involved in the altercation almost immediately. When neighbors began to protest, Newberg escalated to arrest two more residents—and threatened to keep going until the whole neighborhood was in handcuffs. 

Stillmeadow Peace Park Is Baltimore’s Tale Of Urban Reinvention

March 9, 2024 Ethan McLeod, Baltimore Magazine. , , ,
In the woods next to the Stillmeadow Community Fellowship church in Southwest Baltimore, Pastor Michael Martin has another sanctuary he eagerly shares with visitors. The church leaders poses meditative questions—”What do you hear?” “What do you see?” “How does it make you feel?”—as he walks parishioners, neighbors, and other participants in Stillmeadow’s “daytime retreats” through the 10 acres of once-neglected, church-owned property overlooking busy Frederick Avenue. Here, freshly planted and fast-growing saplings, carefully carved-out walking trails, and streamside sitting areas invite each person who passes through to pause.

Why Did Baltimore Lavish Tens Of Millions In Tax Breaks?

March 7, 2024 Taya Graham, Stephen Janis and Jayne Miller, The Real News Network. , , , , ,
Baltimore is often maligned as a shrinking city beset by crime and intractable poverty. But take a walk down President Street just south of Little Italy on a Friday night, and you will enter a world that appears far removed from the idea of a city that is terminally in decay. Past the empty pavilions of the Inner Harbor and east of the city’s increasingly troubled downtown business district, a cluster of towering high-rises emerges from the harbor like a defiant mountain range of concrete. A cobblestone boulevard leads to a European-style thoroughfare dotted with a dazzling array of upscale restaurants and outdoor dining patios.

Baltimore’s Media Nightmare And The Billionairification Of News

February 22, 2024 Justine Barron, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. , , , ,
David D. Smith, leading stockholder of Sinclair, Inc., announced on January 15 that he was purchasing what is left of the Baltimore Sun, once regarded as the crown jewel of the Maryland city’s media (AP, 1/15/24). Sinclair is a multi-billion dollar Fortune 500 company and one of the largest owners of television stations in the country. The company has been criticized for its conservative and not always accurate TV news coverage (Salon, 7/21/17; New Yorker, 10/15/18). In 2018, the company compelled local TV news anchors around the country to read on air the same copy parroting President Donald Trump’s claims about “fake news” (Deadspin, 3/31/18).

Baltimore’s Co-Ops Show There’s Another Way To Work

February 16, 2024 Working People, Grassroots Economic Organizing. , , ,
Baltimore has become what many consider to be ground zero in the emerging “solidarity economy” and the formation of worker-owned, cooperatively run businesses. There’s something important going on here, and there’s a lot that we can all learn from our fellow workers who are in the cooperative space—people who are living, breathing proof that there’s another way to run a business, that there's another way to run our economy, and that there are other ways we can treat work and workers. At a recent event hosted by the Baltimore Museum of Industry titled "Work Matters: Building a Worker-Owned Co-op," Max moderated a panel including workers and representatives from Common Ground Bakery Café, Taharka Bros Ice Cream, A Few Cool Hardware Stores, and the Baltimore Roundtable for Economic Democracy (BRED).
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