Survivors of child sexual abuse cleared an important hurdle Thursday night in their quest to sue complicit institutions, as the Maryland Senate approved vastly expanding eligibility to file civil lawsuits. (From: The Baltimore Banner, by Pamela Wood)
After years of impeding similar proposals, the Maryland Senate on Thursday passed a bill erasing the time limits that once barred many child sex abuse victims from suing institutions that harbored their attackers. (From: The Washington Post, by Erin Cox)
After the House of Delegates approved the bill last week to create a referendum on enshrining a right to abortion in the state constitution, the Senate passed its companion bill Tuesday. (From: The Baltimore Sun, by Hannah Gaskill)
Yesterday’s downward trend in the State’s revenues was both expected and planned for by both legislative chambers, given December’s report from the Board of Revenue Estimates.
The state Senate had a protracted debate Thursday over the practicality of bills to limit the places and circumstances in which gun owners can wear, carry and transport their weapons, and how they can store them. Since the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision in June effectively rendering Maryland’s concealed-carry policy unconstitutional, legislators have been working on bills to re-imagine the state’s gun policy. (From: The Baltimore Sun, by Hannah Gaskill)
Maryland’s Senate gave preliminary approval Thursday to a bill that would prohibit a person from knowingly carrying a firearm onto someone else’s property without the property owner’s express permission and also would prohibit carrying a firearm within 100 feet of public places. (From: Maryland Matters, by William J. Ford)
Legislative leaders are planning to introduce a bill next week that would shift oversight of Maryland’s beleaguered college savings plan to the state treasurer’s office and wind down pre-paid college tuition plans. Sen. President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) said during a Friday morning press briefing that conversations about the best way to handle dysfunction at the Maryland 529 plan have been taking place across the legislative chambers and top leaders will be taking up the offer made by Treasurer Dereck Davis (D) to move the program into his office. (From: Maryland Matters, by Danielle E. Gaines)
Nine members of Gov. Wes Moore’s cabinet received final approval Monday to lead state agencies, including the departments of Agriculture, Labor and Health under the new administration. (From: The Baltimore Sun, by Sam Janesch)
While there has been little doubt that Maryland leaders would seek to strengthen abortion protections during this General Assembly session, the point was reinforced Thursday when dozens of the state’s top leaders, including Gov. Wes Moore (D), came together for a raucous State House news conference to endorse a four-bill reproductive rights legislative package. Several speakers, including Moore, Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller (D), the presiding officers of the House and Senate, and two of the bills’ chief sponsors, discussed the urgency to act since the U.S. Supreme Court dismantled abortion rights with its Dobbs decision last summer. It was the first joint news conference of the legislative term for Moore, House Speaker Adrienne Jones (D-Baltimore County) and Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City). (From: Maryland Matters, by Josh Kurtz)
A legislative committee heard over 10 hours of testimony on a series of bills that would regulate specifically who can carry guns in public in Maryland, and where they can go while armed. (From: The Baltimore Sun, by Hannah Gaskill)
Legislation to enshrine reproductive rights in the Maryland Constitution is now pending in the General Assembly, after bills were introduced in both houses that would put the question of approval to voters. (From: Maryland Matters, by William F. Zorzi)
Both chambers of the Maryland General Assembly on Friday introduced bills charting the state’s course for opening a recreational cannabis market this summer. The expansive legislation, which tackles a host of commerce-related issues, including safety regulations, taxes and licensing equity, comes months after voters overwhelmingly passed a constitutional amendment legalizing recreational marijuana. (From: The Baltimore Banner, by Brenda Wintrode, Pamela Wood and Callan Tansill-Suddath)
Today, Senate President Bill Ferguson and House Speaker Adrienne A. Jones announced legislation that establishes Maryland’s new legal, adult-use cannabis industry.
The first bill approved by the Maryland Senate this year will fund the state’s 988 suicide and crisis hotline. The bill, sponsored by Sen. Malcolm Augustine, a Prince George’s County Democrat, will require the governor to put $12 million for the hotline into the budget in 2025. Augustine’s bill attracted a bipartisan group of 13 senators as cosponsors. (From: The Baltimore Banner, by Pamela Wood)
