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Man dies after two-vehicle crash
A Frederick man died after a two-vehicle crash on Friday night, police said.
Donald Frederick Reineke, 89, was pronounced dead at the scene of the crash in the area of U.S. 40 and Harmony Road, according to Maryland State Police.
Reineke was driving a Toyota Prius north on Harmony Road and attempted to cross U.S. 40, police said in a press release.
John Michael Hartman Jr., 40, of Frederick, was driving a Chevrolet S10 pickup truck east on U.S. 40, through the intersection at Harmony Road.
Police said the Prius and the truck crashed into each other at the intersection.
Hartman was taken by helicopter to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore for treatment of his injuries.
Police were called to the scene shortly before 9:20 p.m. on Friday.
The road was closed for about three hours after the crash. Police said they are still investigating the cause of the crash.
Donald Frederick Reineke | 2022-10-15T16:37:04Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Man dies after two-vehicle crash | Cops And Crime | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/man-dies-after-two-vehicle-crash/article_fd16495e-d856-502c-96fc-26fbad0290d6.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/man-dies-after-two-vehicle-crash/article_fd16495e-d856-502c-96fc-26fbad0290d6.html |
BOARD of CONTRIBUTORS I Jack Topchik
As the grandfather of five young women, ages 23 down to 13, I have had a front row seat to witness the emerging dynamic of a remarkable group of young people.
Generation Z was referred to in one study from Axis, a faith-based group that works with youth, as “millennials on steroids.”
Generation Z has emerged as a population increasingly worthy of attention, especially now as its older members enter young adulthood. Born after 1995, Generation Zs made up one tenth of the 2020 electorate; and while they share a number of characteristics with millennials, their formative years have been shaped by a drastically changing world, resulting in key differences in attitudes, tendencies and outlook.
Who are these creatures of the internet and social media? A major segment of their population, some 75 million, currently between 10 and 25 years of age, are diverse in their acknowledged insistence on, and respect for, racial equality and sexual identity, and they are color blind in regard to individual relationships and friendships.
Compare Gen Zs with the mindset of their grandparents who grew up in the 1950s when the medium of television was in its infancy. Westerns, crime shows and anti-Communist propaganda ruled the air waves. The good guys always won, and the bad guys were killed or sent away to pay their debt to society. No middle ground was offered.
It was not until the late 1960s that television and movies began to seek more realistic portraits of men and women protagonists. This changing of the guard has made it increasingly difficult for Gen Zs to comprehend a society that was so willing to accept the unbelievable.
Guarding against stereotyping them, and Gen Zs are by no means monolithic, Gen Zs are pragmatic and value relationships, and they respect people regardless of how shocking their lifestyles might seem to others. Gen Zs most closely mirror their millennial siblings and friends on key social and political issues but with considerably reduced optimism.
Gen Zs grew up with technology, the internet and social media, which sometimes causes them to be stereotyped as “tech-addicted social justice warriors,” according to the marketing firm Inside Intelligencer.
Gen Zs have struggled through “Generation COVID,” forced with being schooled in the confines of their homes. Many missed their high school graduations, proms and face-to-face meetings with friends. Athletes had their sports seasons canceled, denying many the opportunity to be seen by college scouts, which might have resulted in scholarships.
Some observers have suggested that those disappointments toughened Gen Zs up. I am not so sure of that. Prices were paid socially, emotionally and educationally. Still, they are a hardy bunch.
According to a 2021 report in Newsweek magazine, the United States is experiencing a reckoning with its past. Many Gen Zs do not accept the idea or ideal of “exceptionalism” in defining the American character.
Many see the country as having been built on the backs of slaves, while oppressing immigrants, farm workers, and refugees fleeing wars and political upheaval. Gen Zs condemn the degradation of Native American culture and the theft of indigenous lands as far back as the European landings in the New World. Is that the entire truth? Maybe not, but tell that to an idealistic teenager who has never been offered an expansive, serious historical study of the colonial experience.
The way American history should be taught in schools is a controversial subject and a major battleground in the culture wars that divide the country. The economic and religious obstacles to national unity are extensive. Parent groups in many parts of the country have protested curriculums that they believe present the United States and its Founding Fathers in a negative light.
The 1619 Project, published by The New York Times, is a series of essays, poems and short fiction about the lasting legacy and implications of slavery in the United States, according to the writers of the project. Titled after the year the ship, the White Lion, anchored and sold the first enslaved African people to the English colonies, these essays review the hypocrisy of how a country founded on ideals of freedom preserved the institution of slavery and its lasting legacy.
It is a complicated world that Generation Z will, in time, inherit. Wish them well. | 2022-10-15T19:42:46Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Generation COVID | Columns | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/generation-covid/article_74391b32-341c-5578-bb9c-a6122aa82ae6.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/generation-covid/article_74391b32-341c-5578-bb9c-a6122aa82ae6.html |
Stricken with apoplexy while in Sunday school yesterday morning, James Beard, aged about 55, was removed to his home, 470 East Church street extended, opposite the Ox Fibre Brush Works, where he died at about 5 o’clock yesterday evening. When he left home for the Sunday school of Trinity Methodist Episcopal church, he seemed in usual good health. He discussed the lesson of the day with the other members of the Men’s Bible Class. Just before school was dismissed, while all were standing, Mr. Beard suddenly fell to the floor and seemingly lost all consciousness.
A committee representing the Frederick County Health Association will make a tour of the county towns and rural districts within the next few days in an effort to interest the people of these communities in public health work, and to drive home the need of an extra public health nurse. At a meeting of the association at the Y.M.C.A. Saturday afternoon, it was decided that two public health nurses are needed in the county. One nurse is needed to serve her entire time to work in the city, the other to visit the county centers and organize classes in public health, hygiene, etc.
“The fair is on.” Generally speaking, everything is set and “rearin’” to go. The grounds are covered with tents and the big lot has been transformed into a city of tented houses. All of the chance booths, eating places, ice cream, candy and wafer tents, sideshows, the whip, merry-go-round and Ferris wheel are in place and ready for the big opening day Tuesday. The majority — in fact, nearly all of the racing horses have arrived and are in their respective stables waiting for the starter’s gong to send them on their journey to victory or defeat. Nearly all of the cattle stalls are already filled with various prize-winning herds.
Ceremonial scoops of dirt were raised Friday afternoon as county officials broke ground for the new Frederick County Adult Detention Center. The site is on Md. 85, 3 1/2 miles south of Frederick City. The jail is expected to cost $6.4 million and will house 106 prisoners. Lawrence W. Johnson, director of the county’s Division of Public Works, said the county expects the jail to be completed in 18 months.
Nine bids for the design work on the city’s proposed new parking deck to be built on the old Weinberg Center lot at West Patrick and Court streets, were received Friday. Price estimates ranged from $104,000 to $213,500, but Assistant City Engineer Bal. C. Menon said price is not the first consideration in a design contract. The designers’ concept is a major concern, according to Menon.
Emmitsburg’s community center, Shookstown Road, Owens Creek, the Coxey Brown and Fisher Hollow bridges, and Solarex, the solar breeder, all have something in common. They all represent various states of Frederick County cooperation with other governmental entities to construct projects benefiting the county’s residents. Known as public works projects, they were featured in a public works tour Friday. Lawrence W. Johnson, director of the county Public Works division, led a busload, mostly of county officials, on Friday’s tour around Frederick County.
FALLS CHURCH, Va. — An FBI terrorism analyst was identified Tuesday as the ninth person killed by the Washington-area sniper, shot in the head in an attack investigators say has yielded the most detailed clues yet. For the first time, witnesses were able to give information about license plates on vehicles seen fleeing the scene, including a light-colored Chevrolet Astro van with a burned out rear taillight. A law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said another witness gave a description of a dark-skinned man, possibly Hispanic or Middle Eastern, in a white van.
Local police and emergency agencies have been inundated with phone calls from motorists reporting white vans and box trucks like the one witnesses have seen near several of the sniper shootings that have left nine dead in the Washington area over the past two weeks. Cpl. Dennis Shoemaker of the Frederick County Sheriff’s Office said they are getting “hundreds of calls a day” about vans and trucks matching that description. Frederick police have increased their visibility at area gas stations in light of the shootings.
The Army and the National Institutes of Health announced Tuesday they are in the process of planning a biomedical research partnership that will greatly affect the base. In the near future, scientists from the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), a component of the NIH, will work side by side on base. Over the next decade, new USAMRIID and NIAID biosafety laboratories will be built and connected on a 160-acre plot of Detrick’s campus, said Maj. Gen. Lester Martinez-Lopez, commanding general for U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command. They will create a place where the greatest minds in the country can gather to develop pathogen and biological weapon defenses, he said.
Stricken With Apoplexy
Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church
Ox Fibre Brush Works
Frederick County Health Association
Public Health Nurses
Horse Races
Groundbreaking For Frederick County Adult Detention Center
Weinberg Center Lot
Public Works Projects
Coxey Brown Road
Shookstown Road
White Van White Box Truck
Cpl. Dennis Shoemaker
Biosafey Laboratories
Pathogen And Biological Weapons Defense | 2022-10-16T05:29:26Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 20-40-100 Years Ago — Oct. 16 | News | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-16/article_7c435a31-db7f-5770-ab20-0e66d9cd0925.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-16/article_7c435a31-db7f-5770-ab20-0e66d9cd0925.html |
Officers found a male with a gunshot wound, police said in a press release on Sunday morning.
Officers provided first aid until emergency medical services arrived and took the male to a hospital, police said.
Police said in the press release that it was “an isolated incident, and there is no threat to the community.”
Police did not provide the male’s name or condition or any other circumstances of the shooting. | 2022-10-16T18:07:43Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Police say male found with gunshot wound in Frederick | Cops And Crime | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/police-say-male-found-with-gunshot-wound-in-frederick/article_bdc36a3b-5b10-5a91-9383-020d9f7df634.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/police-say-male-found-with-gunshot-wound-in-frederick/article_bdc36a3b-5b10-5a91-9383-020d9f7df634.html |
Lisa Jarosinski
Jarosinski running with message of collaboration, compromise
Lisa Jarosinski, the Democratic nominee for the Frederick County Council District 2 seat, said she would look to bring people together and help the council "think outside the box" when making land-use decisions.
"I'm running because I would be really, really good at this job. ... I'm really good at building collaboration and compromise and having people work together," Jarosinski said in a podcast interview with the News-Post. "That's what we need in county government."
Before the shift to a charter form of government in 2014, the last Board of Frederick County Commissioners "approved a lot of development without making the developers responsible for" supporting the county's public facilities, like schools and roads, Jarosinski said.
The council, she said, should collaborate with developers and conservationists to "dream big" about growth in the county when considering future land-use proposals. This could include climate-focused projects with solar and wind-powered residential developments that have composting, extra gardens and permeable surfaces, she said.
Jarosinski runs her own business preparing tax returns and bookkeeping. As someone who is self-employed, Jarosinski said that she would have the freedom in her schedule to make the council and her constituents her number-one priority each day.
She's running against Republican County Councilman Steve McKay, who has represented District 2 since 2018.
Jarosinski and McKay squared off in the 2018 general election, too. McKay was elected by more than 4,000 votes, or 17 percentage points.
In her podcast interview, Jarosinski also said she wants to ensure the county continues funding public schools well above the state-required amount, look for ways to expand road shoulders and trail access to improve road safety, and advocate for the county to maintain its property tax rate to pay for government services. | 2022-10-16T21:43:00Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Jarosinski running with message of collaboration, compromise | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/jarosinski-running-with-message-of-collaboration-compromise/article_3ec07f29-bec4-5005-89df-44a6efc752ed.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/jarosinski-running-with-message-of-collaboration-compromise/article_3ec07f29-bec4-5005-89df-44a6efc752ed.html |
McKay running for council to help guide, and moderate, how the county grows
Frederick County Councilman Steve McKay said a major part of his decision to run for a second four-year term is to have a seat at the table when the council votes on land-use changes in the county.
In the last eight years, the County Council has had to vote on few development proposals, said McKay, the Republican nominee for County Council District 2. That's in large part because the county is still "digesting" the developments that the last Board of Frederick County Commissioners approved between 2012 and 2014.
The county switched from a charter form of government, with a county executive and legislative County Council, in 2014.
"If, say, a new major development decision came before the next council, and I weren't there to be a part of it, and it impacted my community, I'd be kicking myself," McKay said in a podcast interview with the News-Post. "I want to be there to help make smart decisions when those new land-use requests do come to the next council. ... I suspect they will."
McKay said he wants the county to grow "modestly." He said he wants to ensure that residential developments do not overburden public schools, roads and the county's ability to provide services.
McKay works as a national security professional for GCI Inc. He has represented District 2 on the County Council since 2018.
The Democratic nominee for District 2 is Lisa Jarosinski, who runs her own business preparing tax returns and bookkeeping. McKay and Jarosinski squared off in the 2018 general election, too. McKay won by more than 4,000 votes, or 17 percentage points.
In his podcast interview, McKay said he would also seek to provide more property tax breaks for retired seniors and retired service members and add public safety to the list of county resources that receive funding from the adequate public facilities ordinance. | 2022-10-16T21:43:06Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | McKay running for council to help guide, and moderate, how the county grows | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/mckay-running-for-council-to-help-guide-and-moderate-how-the-county-grows/article_63e73bed-6030-5c95-b8af-113d33412ce0.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/mckay-running-for-council-to-help-guide-and-moderate-how-the-county-grows/article_63e73bed-6030-5c95-b8af-113d33412ce0.html |
Work by Jim Condron in the exhibit “The Spoon” at Hood College through Oct. 21.
‘The Spoon: 50 Works by Jim Condron’ at Hood College
Artist Jim Condron uses paint, fur, bits of plastic, architectural remnants, socks, candy, vintage bowling pins and the clothing of his late mother to construct his sculptures and assemblages. He collects objects over time for their personal resonance and gradually assembles them, adding paint and various glues and mediums.
Hodson Gallery of Hood College presents “The Spoon,” an exhibition of 50 sculptures and paintings by Condron, on view through Oct. 21.
Condron’s work alludes to weather, holidays, seasons, absurdity, food, disappointment, youth and childhood. Despite the painterly combination of disparate parts, his work confronts personal and historical narratives.
In this exhibition, Condron considers elements of Hood College’s history and invites viewers, students and alumni to contemplate personal and collective memories constructed through their college experience.
Originally from Long Island, New York, Condron lives and works in Baltimore and Brooklyn, New York. He earned his MFA at the Leroy E. Hofffberger School of Painting at the Maryland Institute College of Art and also studied at the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture. His work appears nationally and internationally in galleries and museums as well as in corporate, university, public and private collections.
See his current exhibition at Hood College, 401 Rosemont Ave., Frederick. The gallery is open daily from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. For additional information, call 301-696-3285 or email kern@hood.edu. | 2022-10-17T03:40:54Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | ‘The Spoon: 50 Works by Jim Condron’ at Hood College | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/the-spoon-50-works-by-jim-condron-at-hood-college/article_957e1647-63cb-5094-b026-5ac532161316.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/the-spoon-50-works-by-jim-condron-at-hood-college/article_957e1647-63cb-5094-b026-5ac532161316.html |
Quite a number of familiar faces are seen at the fair. Among these are “Aunt” Rosa Milano, the balloon woman, and her six nephews, of Philadelphia. It is the forty-first consecutive year that “Aunt” Rosa has attended the fair, and she stated that she was real glad to get back in Frederick again. “Aunt” Rosa’s first visit here was back in 1881. Until the past few years “Aunt” Marie Milano, mother of the boys and sister of “Aunt” Rosa, had been a regular visitor for nearly 50 years. On account of her age she does not travel very much these days. “Aunt” Marie’s first visit here was on her wedding trip. She was married at the age of 15, and soon after the wedding, the Frederick fair took place, and she and her husband came on and sold novelties.
There is a shortage of railroad transportation at present, and it is growing to such an extent that it bids fair to seriously curtail production and commerce generally for some time to come. Frederick shippers are feeling the stringency. There are many causes contributing to this in the opinion of many railroad men. For instance, one who is an authority on prevailing conditions points out that on July 1, 1922, out of approximately 2,300,000 freight cars in the country, 345,000 of them were in bad order.
The vicinity of Araby and Baker’s Valley, this county, has been the scene of considerable excitement lately occasioned by the frequent appearance of an unclassified animal that has, however, been termed by rumor as a panther. The animal is said to inhabit a small grove on the farm of Emory Fink, Baker’s Valley, and several people have had unpleasantly thrilling encounters with it. If the animal is really a panther, the killing of it will be a man-sized job. The wild cat, which is related to the panther, although a smaller animal, is sometimes found here and some people have expressed the opinion that the animal, which has been causing the excitement in Baker’s Valley, may belong to the former class.
WASHINGTON — President Bush on Wednesday signed Congress’ war-making resolution and told wary world leaders to “face up to our global responsibilities” to confront Saddam Hussein. “Those who choose to live in denial may eventually be forced to live in fear,” Mr. Bush said, as the United Nations began a bitter debate over his plans to disarm and oust Saddam. “Every nation that shares in the benefits of peace also shares in the duty of defending the peace. ... Our goal is to fully and finally remove a real threat to world peace and to America,” he said.
A proposal to require annual inspections of residential rental properties in the city of Frederick drew objections from landlords, who said the suggested $100 fee unfairly targets them and will cause rental prices to increase.FREDERICK — DynPort Vaccine Co. plans to begin human testing of an anthrax vaccine that it hopes will prove safer than the current alternative. The early clinical testing should begin in a few weeks with 70 volunteers at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Rockville. The company doesn’t expect to receive regulatory approval to market the vaccine until 2010. DynPort, based in Frederick, is a joint venture of DynCorp of Reston, Va., and Porton International Inc. of Paris.
Aunt Rosa Milano
The Balloon Woman
Railroad Transportation Shortage
President Bush
Global Responsibilities
Saddam Huessein
Rental Properties Inspections
Dynport Vaccine Co.
Araby And Baker's Valley
Rosa Milano
Marie Milano | 2022-10-17T06:12:28Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 20-40-100 Years Ago — Oct. 17 | News | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-17/article_6a9e7922-1a25-5cf5-9484-af1c2e6eebf9.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-17/article_6a9e7922-1a25-5cf5-9484-af1c2e6eebf9.html |
Local roundup: MSD football rolls to sixth straight win
Ethan Guettler surpassed 1,000 rushing yards for first time in eight-man football program history at Maryland School for the Deaf, as the Orioles rolled past Randolph-Macon Academy 58-0 Saturday in their annual homecoming game.
It marked the sixth straight win for MSD, which improved to 7-1 this season.
Guettler carried the ball five times for 123 yards and a pair of touchdowns.
Zion Ortiz rushed three times for 90 yards and a touchdown. He also threw the ball three times for 59 yards and two touchdowns. Nathan Sheppeck had 1 carry for 49 yards and 1 touchdown, in addition to recovering a fumble on defense.
Jayden Orsi-Pederson had an 8-yard touchdown catch, Rocco Bauer had a 22-yard scoring catch, and Calvin Traina had a touchdown as well for MSD.
Annapolis Christian 13, SJCP 7
No details were provided from this Saturday game.
Girls Soccer Tuscarora 9, South Hagerstown 1
Nina Conners and Ella Sheridan each scored three goals to lead the Titans to the win. Conners also had three assists, and Alex Bender added two assists. Goalkeeper Mackenzie Facine made four saves for Tuscarora.
Women’s Soccer Mount St. Mary’s 1, Siena 0Freshman Taylor Simmons scored in the 18th minute, and the Mount St. Mary’s defense held strong the rest of the way in a one-goal Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference win at Siena on Saturday afternoon. With the victory, the Mountaineers move to 3-4-7 overall and 2-3-3 in the MAAC this season.
The win moves the Mountaineers into sole possession of sixth place in the MAAC standings with a week and a half left in the regular season. The top six teams earn a spot into the MAAC Tournament with Fairfield leading the table with 21 points, followed by Quinnipiac (18), Niagara (16), Canisius (10), Iona (10) and the Mount (9).
Men’s Soccer Siena 2, Mount St. Mary’s 0Two late goals by the visiting Siena Saints handed Mount St. Mary’s men’s soccer a 2-0 defeat Saturday at Waldron Family Stadium. For the season, the Mount’s record slides to 6-6-1 overall and 2-3-1 in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.
College Cross Country Aubrey Shenk Invitational
Continuing his strong season, John Wang led the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers cross country teams at the 2022 Aubrey Shenk Invitational. In fact, he led all collegiate runners, coming in second overall and posting a time of 24:58.8.
The men’s team at the Mount took second among collegiate teams with a total of 83 points, while the women took 11th, registering a total of 262 points.
Molly Connelly also enjoyed a strong performance for Mount St. Mary’s, coming in third with a time of 22:52 flat for the 6K.
All of the point scorers on the men’s team finished in the top 30. Michael Chipi (26:21.0) came in 15th, John Ruona (26:30.2) in 17th, Paul Fagnano (26:48.5) in 23rd and Kevin Zaleski (26:54.9) in 26th. Although not factoring in the scoring, Brendan Duff (27:35.3) and Seth Lassiter (27:38.8) both finished in the top 50.
The women’s team received point scores from Ellie Dorian (24:15.8), Mary Campbell (26:04.9), Erin Billigmeier (26:43.3) and Ellie Bomberger (26:46.3).
Robert Morris took the top spot for collegiate teams in the men’s race and Scranton finished first in the women’s event.
Hood College’s Katie Driscoll, a Walkesville native, matched the best round of her college career with an 85 in the first round of the Cardinal Classic at Black Rock Golf Course in Hagerstown.
Driscoll cut five strokes off her previous low round and is tied for 13th. It is tied for the second best round in program history and for Hood’s lowest round of the fall.
Hood College’s Jackie Malitzki dished out her 1,000th career assist but it wasn’t enough as Penn State York outlasted the Blazers’ women’s volleyball team in five sets.
The Nittany Lions won 26-24, 25-22, 14-25, 21-25, 15-13.
Malitzki finished with a season-high 46 assists and ended the afternoon with 1,044 assists. She joined Payton Belella, Robin Deniker and Caroline Woodhams as the only players in program history to reach 1,000. Malitzki also had 19 digs in the match.
Freshman Alexandros Bellesis delivered Mount St. Mary’s men’s water polo what could be considered its biggest conference win to date, scoring the game-winning goal with nine seconds remaining to lift the Mount over Navy, 15-14.
The winning shot capped off a busy day for the team, beginning with a competitive contest with Bucknell that went to the Bison late in a 12-8 final. The split brings the Mount’s record to 13-8 (6-5 MAWPC). | 2022-10-17T06:13:11Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Local roundup: MSD football rolls to sixth straight win | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/local-roundup-msd-football-rolls-to-sixth-straight-win/article_a8c79c43-bdde-591c-ab76-c2b04757d597.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/local-roundup-msd-football-rolls-to-sixth-straight-win/article_a8c79c43-bdde-591c-ab76-c2b04757d597.html |
Capitals add depth with Milano
Forward set to start the season in Hershey
The Washington Capitals signed forward Sonny Milano to a one-year, $750,000 contract, the team announced Sunday. Milano was placed on waivers so he could be loaned to the Hershey Bears, the Capitals’ American Hockey League affiliate. If he clears waivers Monday, he is slated to start his season with the Bears.
Milano, 26, had 14 goals and 20 assists in 66 games for the Anaheim Ducks last season. The 6-foot, 194-pound forward was selected 16th overall in the 2014 draft by the Columbus Blue Jackets, who traded him to Anaheim in February 2020.
This year, Milano was at Calgary Flames training camp on a professional tryout offer. The Flames released him in early October after he went scoreless in four preseason games.
“He was a good player last year,” Capitals Coach Peter Laviolette said. “He was available. . . . He’s a real good young player and adds depth to our organization.”
Washington lost young forwards Brett Leason and Axel Jonsson-Fjallby on waivers last week. Leason, a second-round pick in 2019, was picked up by Anaheim; the 23-year-old winger played 36 regular-season games for Washington last season and notched three goals and three assists. Jonsson-Fjallby, a 24-year-old Swedish winger, was claimed by Winnipeg; the 2016 fifth-round pick had two goals and two assists in 23 games. Neither player has appeared with his new team.
It’s unclear when Milano could make the jump to the NHL, but Laviolette said Hershey would just be the starting point. Washington has 14 forwards on its roster, with Connor McMichael and Joe Snively serving as the two extras in the first three games.
McMichael, 21, does not need to pass through waivers to be sent to the AHL, but Snively, 26, does. Forward Aliaksei Protas, who has not registered a point in the first three games, also does not need to pass through waivers, but it appears he has made a strong impression on the coaching staff.
“He’s done a really good job,” Laviolette said. “We’re going to meet with him [Sunday] just to go over some of the details of the game and stuff like that, but he is working really hard and generating a few chances a night. Hasn’t gone in for him yet, [but] he’s noticeable. His numbers are good. He plays in the offensive zone. He is pretty good defensively.” | 2022-10-17T06:13:17Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Capitals add depth with Milano | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/capitals-add-depth-with-milano/article_69e13314-a36e-55f7-9d2c-6c05e674e5da.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/capitals-add-depth-with-milano/article_69e13314-a36e-55f7-9d2c-6c05e674e5da.html |
BOARD of CONTRIBUTORS I Anadi Naik
In a world that triggers so much of hopelessness, America stands as a land of hope. People who are already here by birth or by design spread that quality on to others. Many find it reassuring.
Therefore, they line up to come here.
The ability to provide hope to a hopeless world ordinarily should be considered the best quality one could ask for. Yet, some of the responsible people in the country feel offended by it. They go to great lengths to keep the door closed so that no one can get in.
When the governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, sends busloads of immigrants to “sanctuary” cities, he thinks he is doing a good thing. Back home, for the newcomers, the situation is desperate.
In order to escape the plight, a mother sends her 12-year-old alone with a dollar and a cross hanging on his chest. A farmer leaves his wife and children behind so that he can provide for them better by picking apples and strawberries in America.
Those who leave their homes do not do so easily. It is unfortunate that we do not see the human tragedy that each of the immigrants represent. People usually do not migrate to a country that is poorer than their own. Having a rich neighbor nearby helps.
Poverty is a by-product of lack of opportunities; less respect for one group by another; a lack of use of technology; and avoidance of work and swindling from top to bottom. However, the same people who never made their hands dirty by working in their own country have no problem in cleaning hospital floors.
It is generally accepted that if one works hard and intelligently, one can get ahead from poverty to wealth. Infected immediately with hopefulness that the country so clearly spreads, the new arrivals become part of the symphony called American values.
Whether the person closing the door is a DeSantis or a Trump or a Miller, the story is the same. Their ancestors came here to avoid persecution and poverty just like those who are coming now. Then those were too many. And now these people are also too many.
Throughout America’s history, the new arrivals have never been welcome. There has always been something wrong with them until they made their presence felt. In the early part of the last century many East European Jews could not land in their promised land because they “carried diseases,” and local Jewish leaders thought they did not deserve to come because they “were not sophisticated enough.” Today, when we read about those stories, we find it disturbing.
In almost every American city, there is a section where one particular ethnic group lives predominantly. There are businesses predominantly owned by a particular ethnic group. Ethnic restaurants add flavor, and they also draw people from around the area that benefit other businesses.
As time goes by, the newcomers become a part of the American fabric and contribute profusely to the strength and durability of America. However, a narrowly developed political self-interest muddies the water. Instead of elevating citizens’ minds toward compassion and friendship, they infuse those with hate and anger. A deafening yell comes from different sources: “They are going to ruin our country.”
Like a jet stream, we do not see, but it is there. America’s philosophy of hard work is powerful, and for a newcomer, it is inescapable. With freedom of expression, this automatically becomes the lifeline to the future.
Right now, Russia is crying for people. Vladimir Putin is encouraging young women to have as many as 10 children and promises that the state will take care of everything. Yet, there are few takers. Young people need freedom, jobs and stability. With none of this available at hand, the last thing they want to do is bring a child into this world. It is a closed society. It cannot be our ideal. | 2022-10-17T08:31:38Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Hope for the future | Columns | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/hope-for-the-future/article_6eb9a095-6cef-54a2-92d2-0720c3436af5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/hope-for-the-future/article_6eb9a095-6cef-54a2-92d2-0720c3436af5.html |
Rebecca Pearl will exhibit her third all-equestrian show at Artist Angle Gallery this month.
A reception for “Horse Power,” her exhibit of new paintings, will be held from 6 to 9 p.m. Oct. 27 at Artist Angle, 124 S. Carroll St., Frederick.
“I am so grateful to have this exposure in downtown Frederick, and paint the subject I love the most,” Pearl says.
See rebeccapearl.com for info about the artist.
Call 240-285-3758 for more information about the gallery.
"From the Pages of PAN: Art Nouveau Prints, 1895-1900" — through Jan. 29, 2023, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, 401 Museum Drive, Hagerstown. Features lithographs, etchings and woodcuts by renowned artists such as Auguste Rodin, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Paul Signac, Georges Seurat, Käthe Kollwitz, Peter Behrens and Aubrey Beardsley, among others. PAN was an avant-garde periodical that sought to represent an overview of cutting-edge international graphic art. Works encompass the art nouveau movement, expressionism, post-impressionism, and symbolism and give a view of the both artistic and intellectual life of this period. This exhibition is from the collection of the Richard H. Driehaus Museum and is organized by Landau Traveling Exhibitions. Free admission. Hours are Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Sunday, 1 to 5 p.m. Closed Nov. 24-25; Dec. 24-25 and Dec. 31-Jan. 1. Go to www.wcmfa,org.
Rebecca Pearl
Artist Angle | 2022-10-17T10:43:49Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Art Exhibits | Visual Arts | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/art-exhibits/article_a7a6a867-7875-57b6-ad79-9bd9c9ff1737.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/art-exhibits/article_a7a6a867-7875-57b6-ad79-9bd9c9ff1737.html |
Sarah Jessica Parker as Sarah Sanderson, Bette Midler as Winifred Sanderson and Kathy Najimy as Mary Sanderson in Disney Plus’ “Hocus Pocus 2.”
Courtesy of Disney Plus
Check out these new scary movies
Come Halloween, television networks and streaming services offer their curated takes on frightening flicks worth watching. Some are horror masterpieces and others campy classics. Meanwhile, film studios continue to release horror films each year, and 2022 is no different. Here are some 2022 horror movies worth checking out.
• “Hocus Pocus 2,” a sequel to the cult-classic film from 1993, stars Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kathy Najimy and Doug Jones. This time, three young women accidentally bring back the Sanderson Sisters to modern-day Salem.
• “Scream” — Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette return to reprise roles they made famous 25 years ago. A new killer dons the “ghostface” mask and terrorizes a California town. Screams undoubtedly ensue.
• “Hellbender” — A teen and her mother reside in the woods and pursue a passion for making music. A chance encounter with another teen has Izzy learning about a connection between her family and witchcraft, which causes a rift with her mother.
• “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” — The sequel to the 1974 hit arrives streaming on Netflix. A new group of victims unknowingly disrupt Leatherface’s home and are in for a gruesome surprise.
• “Fresh” — Noa finally meets what appears to be the ideal guy in Steve during a meet-cute in the supermarket. They exchange numbers and begin a relationship, planning to head away for the weekend. The rosy glow of their relationship soon extinguishes when Steve’s warped desires come to the surface.
• “The Requin” — A romantic trip goes south when a couple’s villa is swept to sea during a storm. The couple is forced to do what it takes to survive. The added horror comes from sharks circling them below.
• “Umma” — This supernatural thriller tells the story of Amanda, a quiet beekeeper who receives her mother’s ashes from South Korea. She is told that the mother’s “anger will grow as long as she remains in the box.” Soon after Amanda is tormented by her mother’s spirit.
• “Morbius” — This offering from Marvel tells the tale of Michael Morbius. When he tries to cure himself of a rare blood disorder, Morbius actually turns himself into a living vampire, blurring the lines between good and evil.
• “Choose or Die” — Viewers will ponder if a video game actually can kill. That’s because young student Kayla stumbles upon an old game from the 1980s that mirrors the “choose your own adventure” books of the era. It offers a $125,000 cash prize to the winner. Having been laid off, Kayla begins play, only to discover that what occurs in the game has very real consequences in her real life.
• “Studio 666” — The rock band Foo Fighters moves into a California mansion to record an album. However, that abode is steeped not only in rock and roll memories, but some grisly history as well. | 2022-10-17T15:50:25Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Check out these new scary movies | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/check-out-these-new-scary-movies/article_7f227161-031b-57fe-8858-43a06f8e229c.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/check-out-these-new-scary-movies/article_7f227161-031b-57fe-8858-43a06f8e229c.html |
Have fun, but be safe this Halloween season.
Tips to keep kids safe on Halloween
When Halloween arrives, most people are interested in the entertaining aspects and the abundance of sweet foods that are there for the taking. Even though fun may be foremost on the brain, it is important for everyone to keep safety in mind as well.
According to the Florida Law Group, Halloween is a time of heightened injuries and fatalities. While no one wants to put a damper on Halloween festivities, it’s important that everyone celebrate safely.
Halloween falls on a Monday this year, and that could be more dangerous than if it fell on a weekend. According to Autoinsurance.com, which conducted a study that analyzed 24 years’ worth of data provided by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, injuries to children and pedestrians in general were higher on weeknight than weekend holidays, with most accidents occurring between 6 and 7 p.m., prime commuter time. Exercise extreme caution when walking around this year.
Medical masks may still be worn by some families as precautions against COVID-19. However, when it comes to Halloween costumes, face paints are preferable to masks and other face coverings. Masks tend to limit visibility, which can lead to kids tripping and falling or even not being able to see cars or other pedestrians. Follow safety instructions when using face paints around the eyes and mouth.
In late October, the sun sets at 5:50 p.m. on average. With darkness descending during peak trick-or-treating times, it’s imperative that children carry flashlights or glow sticks or utilize reflective tape on their costumes so others can see them.
Children trick-or-treating with adults may be able to venture a bit farther in pursuit of treats, but it is generally safer to stay close to home, where surroundings are familiar. This reduces the propensity for getting lost or wandering into sketchy situations. Older kids allowed to venture out on their own would be wise to stay close to home as well. Neighbors can assist if something goes awry, and there’s less chance of getting turned around. | 2022-10-17T15:50:31Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Tips to keep kids safe on Halloween | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/tips-to-keep-kids-safe-on-halloween/article_90af2df7-48a4-5ff0-9b15-dd9466c4734d.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/tips-to-keep-kids-safe-on-halloween/article_90af2df7-48a4-5ff0-9b15-dd9466c4734d.html |
Carey Anne Farrell
Singer-songwriter Carey Anne Farrell at Beans in the Belfry
Singer-songwriter Carey Anne Farrell, a Frederick native who currently resides in Chicago, will return to Maryland on Oct. 21 to perform a record release concert at Beans in the Belfry in support of her debut album, “Someone Else’s Wings.”
The show will run from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Brunswick venue.
Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Frederick, Farrell started vocal training at age 7, later adding trombone, guitar and other assorted noisemakers to her skill set. In 2002, she moved to Chicago and began taking songwriting classes at the Old Town School of Folk Music while playing local clubs and coffeehouses.
Life (and grad school) intervened for a little while, but with the help of Theme Music, a Facebook group where musicians of all skill levels come together to record songs based on weekly themes, Farrell found her way back to music.
Farrell’s versatile mezzo-soprano voice, sweet melodies and thoughtful lyrics have garnered comparisons to Dar Williams, Aimee Mann and Chrissie Hynde. “Someone Else’s Wings” is an eclectic collection of original songs about family, loss, fandom, art, femininity, mythology and entomology. From the gentle folk of “Back East” to the swirling dream-pop of “Elena by the Ocean,” and from the hypnotic “Breathe With Me” to the searing “Cassandra Sleeps,” “Someone Else’s Wings” spans genres as well as subject matter.
Offstage, Farrell is the author of the young adult novel “Forward March,” the photographer behind best-selling author Erin Morgenstern’s beloved “Flax-Golden Tales,” a preschool teacher and private music instructor, and an enthusiastic dancer. She lives with her husband and her ever-growing collections of records, books, musical instruments and creepy dolls. | 2022-10-17T18:33:49Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Singer-songwriter Carey Anne Farrell at Beans in the Belfry | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/singer-songwriter-carey-anne-farrell-at-beans-in-the-belfry/article_f58af51c-077f-59b1-8212-fed65063de5e.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/singer-songwriter-carey-anne-farrell-at-beans-in-the-belfry/article_f58af51c-077f-59b1-8212-fed65063de5e.html |
Community members gathered in Myersville on Sunday for a 5K in memory of Deputy First Class Kenny Olander. The event raised money for Olander's wife and children.
Photo by Dawn Miskell
Sheriff Chuck Jenkins speaks in Myersville at a 5K held in memory of Deputy First Class Kenny Olander. The event raised money for Olander's wife and children.
Deputy First Class Kenny Olander
Memorial run raises money for family of late Myersville deputy
Hundreds of people who came out for a 5K in memory of Deputy First Class Kenny Olander of the Frederick County Sheriff's Office on Sunday showed that the late officer is not forgotten.
A "Run to Remember" took place Sunday afternoon, starting at Harp Park in Myersville, to honor Olander's memory and raise money for his family.
Olander, 61, was a 32-year veteran of the sheriff's office. He died in March after developing complications from a recent illness, according to the sheriff's office. He is survived by his wife, Samantha, and three children, Bailey, Hugh and Sophia.
“He was a well-known and well-respected and trusted member of the community," race committee member Colleen Pietrucha said in an interview Monday.
Olander was the community deputy for Myersville.
In his career with the sheriff's office, he also worked as a patrol operations deputy, served with the traffic unit, and was a school resource officer. He was a longtime, certified Drug Recognition Expert within the state and served as the lead DRE representative for the agency.
Pietrucha did not know Olander personally, but she grew up in Myersville and often saw him on patrol.
After Olander's death, Pietrucha said, she and others from Myersville put their heads together to find a way to support his family, which led to the 5K.
More than 250 people showed up Sunday, Pietrucha said. Though the final figure is being calculated, she estimated they raised about $6,000.
"We were absolutely thrilled," she said. "I think that's a tribute to the cause."
Participants young and old came out for the event. Little ones joined the 1K fun run with their parents, and a 97-year-old walked, too.
Pietrucha said one supporter drove three hours to be there.
The Olander family's 13-year-old golden retriever stole the hearts of many, according to Pietrucha.
Youngsters played with dozens of beach balls on the tennis court. Smitty's Smoked Meats and Eats food truck kept bellies full. The town of Myersville sponsored the event.
Organizes plan to hold the 5K annually.
Pietrucha said many families, including those of police officers, stayed after the run and socialized. Spirits were high and the weather was beautiful, Pietrucha recalled.
“We were sure Deputy Olander was looking down," she said.
Colleen Pietrucha
Kenny Olander | 2022-10-17T23:16:30Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Memorial run raises money for family of late Myersville deputy | Crime & justice | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/memorial-run-raises-money-for-family-of-late-myersville-deputy/article_0f463d6f-872d-5823-b124-3a2fcc011e7b.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/memorial-run-raises-money-for-family-of-late-myersville-deputy/article_0f463d6f-872d-5823-b124-3a2fcc011e7b.html |
Gilly Rodgers, left, and Glorie Cassutto, support programs director at The Frederick Center, pose for a portrait in the center's meeting room. Together with Amanda Holk, Rodgers and Cassutto helped start a support group for members of the LGBTQ community who come out later in life.
'Worth the Wait': New Frederick Center group supports LGBT people who come out later in life
Earlier this month, on the night before The Frederick Center’s new support group was supposed to meet, Gilly Rodgers gave her best friend, Amanda Holk, a call.
The two of them had helped the LGBTQ advocacy nonprofit come up with the idea for Worth the Wait, a support group for members of the gay, transgender and gender non-conforming communities who came out later in life.
Rodgers and Holk — both of them 35-year-old moms — met over the summer, while each was starting the process of coming out. They knew they couldn’t be the only members of the LGBTQ community in Frederick who had waited to publicly share their identity with others.
But with the first support group meeting looming so closely, Rodgers was nervous. What if hardly anybody showed up?
Holk reassured her friend.
“Gilly,” she said. “If one person gets the support they need because of this group, then this group was worth it.”
When they arrived at The Frederick Center on the evening of Oct. 6, however, it didn’t take them long to realize they didn’t have to be worried about attendance.
Even though Holk and Rodgers had come early, there were already people inside, waiting for the group to begin. Still more arrived as the clock ticked closer to 6 p.m. Someone had to run upstairs to get more chairs.
By the time the meeting started, the room was crowded with nearly 30 people. There were younger adults in their early 20s, as well as people closer to Rodgers' and Holk’s age. One woman — whose story brought everyone to tears, Rodgers said — was in her 80s.
After the meeting, she and Holk walked home in silence.
“Oh my God,” Holk remembers thinking. “Our community needed this so much.”
Before starting Worth the Wait, The Frederick Center had plenty of support groups for younger people and — as of May — one geared toward older, retired people, called Aging With Pride.
But when it came to people who were old enough to be adults and young enough to not yet consider themselves to be “aging,” there was a gap, said Glorie Cassutto, support programs director for The Frederick Center.
People in their teens and tweens are expected to still be figuring themselves out and having realizations about their identity, said Cassutto, who uses they/them pronouns.
But for adults — who may be married to someone who is heterosexual or have children — coming out can be life-changing, Cassutto said.
“I am really hopeful that folks will see this as a safe space to help themselves figure things out and help other people figure things out,” they said, “and together we can build some friendships, build some positive relationships, and get that support that we need to carry on in our lives.”
Rodgers began coming to terms with the fact that she’s queer over the summer.
Married to a man whom she loves, Rodgers second-guessed her identity.
“Even now, going through it, I think, ‘Well, it would be so much easier to go back into the closet and live my heteronormative lifestyle, the way society expects me to,’” she said. “It would just be easier than blowing up my whole life.”
But, with the help of her therapist, she had an epiphany. So much of the stress, anxiety and depression she was experiencing was because she was trying to fit herself inside a box where she just didn’t fit.
And once she started to come out of that box, she said, she couldn’t go back.
Holk also talked about boxes when describing her coming out journey.
Throughout her life, she said, it always felt as though she was hiding something from herself — like there was a box inside of her that she wasn’t allowed to open.
From time to time, she’d come out to herself. But before long, she’d shove those feelings back inside the box.
“It’s just hard to explain how you can lie to yourself through this process,” she said.
Now, instead of shoving her feelings away, she tries to listen to herself. There’s celebration and joy in coming out, she said, but it can also be a scary and lonely process.
She wants Worth the Wait to be a safe place for people who are questioning their sexuality and for those who are closeted, but want to share their identity with others. Nobody should have to go through their journey alone, she said.
Cassutto hopes the support group becomes a place where queer adults can find a community and make friends. It becomes a lot easier to be yourself and connect with others when it doesn’t feel like you’re hiding, they said.
“I’m really hoping that folks do see that [coming out] is truly worth the wait,” Cassutto said. “Once you’re able to be who you are with people who love you for who you are, there’s just a lot of goodness to be had.”
Worth the Wait is held at 6 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month at The Frederick Center, at 322 W. Patrick St in Frederick.
Amanda Holk
Gilly Rodgers | 2022-10-17T23:16:42Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 'Worth the Wait': New Frederick Center group supports LGBT people who come out later in life | Social issues | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/social_issues/worth-the-wait-new-frederick-center-group-supports-lgbt-people-who-come-out-later-in/article_68b5c1f9-e2e0-56cc-9e19-c1e75deaedbc.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/social_issues/worth-the-wait-new-frederick-center-group-supports-lgbt-people-who-come-out-later-in/article_68b5c1f9-e2e0-56cc-9e19-c1e75deaedbc.html |
A union that represents Frederick County’s career firefighters on Monday accused the county of “misuse of public funds” and “unethical behavior” for creating a committee in support of a ballot question about who has the final say in bargaining disputes.
The county government created its ballot issue committee on Sept. 27 in support of ballot Question A, according to the Maryland State Board of Elections.
Question A, which is on general election ballots in Frederick County, would change wording in the county’s charter to clarify that the County Council has the final say in bargaining disputes between the county and its career firefighters.
Stephen Jones, president of the Career Firefighters Association of Frederick County — also known as International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) Local 3666 — called on the Frederick County Council to investigate the county’s “misuse of public funds” for the ballot issue committee.
“We intend to file with the appropriate bodies to shed light on this unethical behavior,” Jones said in a news release.
County Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer, D, could not immediately be reached for comment on Monday.
County spokeswoman Vivian Laxton wrote in an email on behalf of County Executive Jan Gardner, D, that, “the county has an obligation to inform the public about ballot initiatives and their implication for county taxpayers, in this instance how it could impact the county’s budget.”
“Forming a committee is the best way to provide a balanced perspective on the issue in the most transparent manner,” Laxton wrote.
In her email, Laxton wrote that the county has incurred “some” expenses, but has not yet paid any bills.
On behalf of Frederick County Attorney Bryon Black, Laxton wrote: “A county is within its legal rights to educate the public about a ballot measure that affects the county. That has been confirmed by local and state election officials.”
The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled in 2015 that Montgomery County officials were within their rights to use taxpayers’ money and county employees to encourage voters to approve a similar ballot question in 2012.
Montgomery County officials urged voters to pass the referendum, which limited collective bargaining rights for police.
With approval by the county executive, the county’s director of public information spent about $122,000 on an advocacy effort, for things such as ads, bumper stickers, posters, lawn signs, mass mailings and consultants, the Court of Appeals decision says.
The police union sued over whether the county could use money and employees to persuade voters on a ballot measure. The union won at the circuit court level, but lost before the Court of Special Appeals and the Court of Appeals.
Montgomery County voters were in favor of the referendum, according to the Maryland State Board of Elections. More than 58% of the vote was in favor of the amendment.
The arbitrator’s ruling would be binding for the county executive. The County Council, though, would have the authority to decrease a contract amount that an arbitrator determined.
The county’s charter gives the County Council the final say in labor disputes because the council is the final vote on the county’s budget, which funds the budget for the Division of Fire and Rescue Services.
Following the vote, the firefighters union sued the county, saying an arbitrator’s decision should be binding for the entire county, including the County Council, the News-Post reported in October 2020.
A judge dismissed the case in March 2021, the News-Post reported.
This year’s ballot question is meant to clarify that the council has the final say, Council Vice President Michael Blue, R, said in July. Blue sponsored the proposed charter amendment. The council voted 6-1 in favor of putting the amendment to the county’s voters in November.
Blue said in July that if voters go against the proposed charter amendment, a labor dispute with county firefighters would be more likely to go to court, where a judge would rule on the council’s authority.
The firefighters’ union, though, sees the charter amendment in a different light.
“We see Question ‘A’ as an attempt to take us backwards and undo the progress that has been made since the voters overwhelmingly approved Question ‘D’ in 2018,” union spokeswoman Katie Nash wrote in an email to the News-Post on behalf of Jones.
The firefighters union is expected to hold a press conference Tuesday at 10 a.m. in front of Winchester Hall to “announce their actions in response” to the county creating a ballot issue committee.
Career Firefighters Association Of Frederick County
phydeaux994 Oct 17, 2022 11:17pm
I support a fair wage for firefighters and LEO’s and all County employees. But I think the firefighters campaign on Question D was an unethical sneak attack on the voters. They bombarded the County with yard signs and rallies that implied that you were evil if you didn’t vote in their favor. I would venture to say that the vast majority of the voters didn’t have a clue about the implications of passing Question D. I didn’t until our neighborhood turned yellow with their signs and I wondered what it was all about. So I read it and realized they were asking for unlimited raises that could bankrupt the County. They knew exactly what they were doing.
Andy S at FNP.
The name calling from Cd Reid over the weekend and today has gotten really out of hand.
Please tell us why you pretend it’s not happening.
He’s got friends in high places. You can tell that after 7 years of exactly the same garbage he’s untouchable. Type “Glen Shiel Frederick News Post” (his original pseudonym) into your search engine and you will bring up his comments from 2015 and 2016. They haven’t changed much. Racist, hateful drivel. But he’s still here in all his glory.
Why is Katie Nash involved in this? Sorry, lady, way too many hats. I have some sympathies with the firefighters, but reading your name 86'd most of that. | 2022-10-18T03:29:30Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Firefighters union says Frederick County misusing funds by forming ballot issue committee | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/firefighters-union-says-frederick-county-misusing-funds-by-forming-ballot-issue-committee/article_c5531794-c2d7-5052-a92e-e8c6dbb480c0.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/firefighters-union-says-frederick-county-misusing-funds-by-forming-ballot-issue-committee/article_c5531794-c2d7-5052-a92e-e8c6dbb480c0.html |
Carson Wentz underwent surgery Monday in Los Angeles to repair a fractured finger on his right hand, and his timeline for recovery remains uncertain, the team announced. If Wentz does miss time, the team will again turn to backup and fan favorite Taylor Heinicke to fill the void. Rookie Sam Howell would serve as his backup.
Wentz suffered the injury late in the second quarter of Washington’s win at the Chicago Bears on Thursday, but he played the entire game without a splint or tape for protection. He said afterward his hand was “a little sore” but added he would be “all right.”
Wentz saw a specialist in Los Angeles on Monday to determine the next steps, which included surgery. Placing him on injured reserve is a possibility, but it is not guaranteed. If Wentz does end up on IR, he would have to miss at least the next four games before returning to practice.
The Commanders host the Green Bay Packers on Sunday at FedEx Field, then travel to Indianapolis to face Wentz’s former team in Week 8. A home game against the Minnesota Vikings and a trip to Philadelphia follow.
Wentz’s injury is the latest on a long list for the Commanders, who lost starting center Chase Roullier to a knee injury earlier in the season and are still without star defensive end Chase Young (ACL). Seven other starters have missed time this season because of injuries.
If Wentz is sidelined, Washington will swap out its starting quarterback for the ninth time since 2020, when Ron Rivera was hired as coach. It would also mark the team’s third switch to Heinicke.
Heinicke signed with Washington in December 2020 as an emergency quarterback in case of a coronavirus outbreak. He got his first start in the team’s playoff loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in January 2021 and impressed enough to land a second contract with the team.
Last season, Heinicke took over again when Ryan Fitzpatrick suffered a season-ending hip injury in Week 1. He went on to lead Washington to a 7-8 record as a starter. It was clear at the end of the season, however, that the Commanders planned to find a longer-term starter who could stretch the field vertically in coordinator Scott Turner’s offense.
So in March, Washington traded for Wentz and took on his full $22 million salary. The Commanders swapped 2022 second-round picks with the Indianapolis Colts and gave up two draft picks — a third-rounder in 2022 and a conditional third-rounder in 2023. The 2023 third-round selection would turn into a second-round pick if Wentz were to play 70 percent of the Commanders’ snaps this season. Should he miss significant time, that becomes less likely.
The price was hefty for a starting quarterback, especially one who was traded twice in as many seasons with a slew of not-so-flattering reports that followed. But Washington believed Wentz could stabilize its offense and that he could revive his career to become a long-term solution. If anything, he had the size and the arm strength, and it seemed that, with the right pieces around him, the Commanders could create a more explosive offense.
“It allows us to throw the ball vertical even more so than we have in the past,” Rivera said in March during Wentz’s introductory news conference at team headquarters. “... The vertical attack opens up a lot more things, opens up some things underneath in the passing game. It opens up some of the running game, knowing that [the defense is] not going to be able to put eight guys up in the box. ... I think it will really help us to attack our opponents differently.”
But the offense with Wentz at the helm has lagged for much of the past six weeks. Wentz has taken 23 sacks, tied for the league high, and the Commanders rank among the bottom nine in net yards, third-down conversion rate and scoring.
Though Heinicke lacks the coaching staff’s preferred size for the position and doesn’t have Wentz’s arm, his return could jump-start the Commanders — or at least help them play at the level they did last season. Injuries to Wentz’s knee and back over the years seemingly have curtailed his athleticism, limiting the offense and its playbook. Heinicke’s knack for improvising and escaping the pocket to avoid pressure could help Washington keep plays alive and extend drives. | 2022-10-18T05:22:27Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Commanders QB Carson Wentz to undergo surgery on fractured finger | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/commanders-qb-carson-wentz-to-undergo-surgery-on-fractured-finger/article_285fac48-e396-56ed-98b5-da2fca59ea35.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/commanders-qb-carson-wentz-to-undergo-surgery-on-fractured-finger/article_285fac48-e396-56ed-98b5-da2fca59ea35.html |
By Mark Maske,
Nicki Jhabvala and Liz Clarke The Washington Post
NEW YORK — The office of D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine has nearly completed its investigation of the Washington Commanders and their owner, Daniel Snyder, and is planning to take further actions in the case, according to a person familiar with the investigation.
Racine (D) and his team “are moving full steam ahead,” according to that person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
The development arrives as NFL team owners are scheduled to hold a one-day meeting Tuesday in New York amid the ongoing controversy involving Snyder.
It is not clear what potential actions are being contemplated by Racine’s office, which includes more than 700 attorneys and staff members and is responsible for enforcing the D.C. laws through criminal and civil means.
Racine’s office has been investigating the Commanders and Snyder since the fall of 2021 following allegations of sexual harassment and workplace misconduct, according to the person familiar with the probe. The investigation also has dealt with the circumstances surrounding the NFL’s handling of the allegations against Snyder and the Commanders and more recently has included the team’s ticket sales practices, according to that person. Racine’s office has reviewed tens of thousands of documents produced by the Commanders and the NFL and has interviewed witnesses that include former cheerleaders and team executives, according to that person.
Racine became D.C.’s first elected attorney general in 2015; he announced last year he would not seek a third term. With Racine’s endorsement, D.C. attorney Brian Schwalb won a three-way race in June for the Democratic nomination for the office.
The office first disclosed its investigation of the Commanders and Snyder in April, soon after allegations of financial improprieties by the Commanders and Snyder were detailed in a letter from the House Committee on Oversight and Reform to the Federal Trade Commission. That same day, Jason S. Miyares (R), Virginia’s attorney general, told the attorneys for the team and Snyder his office would investigate the allegations of financial improprieties outlined by the committee’s letter. The team has denied committing any financial improprieties.
Snyder and the team also are being investigated separately by the congressional committee and the NFL. Tom Davis, an attorney for Snyder and a former chairman of the committee, wrote earlier this month in a letter to Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.), the committee’s chairwoman, that the panel’s Democratic-led investigation has been “a politically inspired hatchet job” designed to remove Snyder from the NFL.
No formal discussion of Snyder or the Commanders is on the agenda for Tuesday’s quarterly owners meeting, according to multiple people familiar with the agenda, and the owners are not expected to take any official actions regarding Snyder, with the findings of White’s investigation still pending. The committee also could issue a final report on its investigation in the coming weeks.
But the owners could have an impromptu discussion about Snyder during their privileged session at the end of Tuesday’s meeting, when other team executives are not present. NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is likely to be questioned about the situation during the news conference that he traditionally holds at the conclusion of any league meeting.
Tanya Snyder, the franchise’s co-CEO, and team president Jason Wright are expected to represent the Commanders at the meeting.
Multiple NFL owners told The Post last month that they believe serious consideration may be given to attempting to oust Snyder from the league’s ownership ranks, by convincing him to sell his franchise or by voting to remove him. “He needs to sell,” one of those owners said. “Some of us need to go to him and tell him that he needs to sell.”
But any move toward taking such a vote still could be months off. In the meantime, it is unclear what Snyder’s ownership status is. His attorneys said last week that Snyder is “no longer under any NFL restriction” related to his involvement in the day-to-day operations of the franchise.
But Goodell and the league consistently have said that Snyder’s status has not changed since the July 2021 announcement that the team was being fined $10 million, based on the findings of previous investigation of its workplace conducted by attorney Beth Wilkinson, and that Tanya Snyder would oversee the franchise’s daily operations for an unspecified period. NFL officials have said Goodell will discuss Daniel Snyder’s status with him once White’s investigation is completed.
Karl A. Racine | 2022-10-18T05:22:33Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | D.C. attorney general plans to take action on Daniel Snyder, Commanders | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/d-c-attorney-general-plans-to-take-action-on-daniel-snyder-commanders/article_3bb9dceb-157e-5ab4-bd34-d28d7a5f1b47.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/d-c-attorney-general-plans-to-take-action-on-daniel-snyder-commanders/article_3bb9dceb-157e-5ab4-bd34-d28d7a5f1b47.html |
Frederick native AJ Mattes’ specialty is slopestyle — a type of snowboarding that is run on an obstacle course-like downhill and features jumps and rails. The 16-year-old attends The Winter Sports School in Park City, Utah, which specializes in training winter sport athletes.
Photo by Cullen McHale
AJ Mattes
Flair in rare air: Frederick native AJ Mattes, 16, has taken snowboarding to the sport's hotbed in Utah
Sometimes, AJ Mattes just needs a good tune to get in a groove when snowboarding.
It’s often a reggae song — Zungguzungguguzungguzeng by Yellowman is his favorite — that helps him relax and feel like he’s gliding down the mountain as if he’s surfing at the beach.
When the horns kick in, he launches himself over 20 feet in the air, spinning around two times and grabbing his board to complete his favorite trick, the backside 720 with a melon grab.
“I feel like I’m riding so much doper just because there’s music playing. I feel like I’m in a music video,” Mattes said.
That’s the type of flair the Frederick native goes for in competitions, and it’s helped him quickly move up the youth circuit and compete nationally.
Mattes, 16, now trains full time with the Park City Ski and Snowboard team in Utah and attends The Winter Sports School, a nearby charter school that has an altered schedule to support winter sport athletes.
It’s been a quick progression for Mattes, who first took an interest in snowboarding during family trips to Liberty Mountain in Pennsylvania. He first hit the slopes when he was around 11 years old, picking up tricks by watching YouTube videos of snowboarder Casey Willax.
After a few years of self-teaching, he wanted a bigger challenge and began researching top mountains on the East Coast.
“It was mainly just for experience because a lot of people don’t know that you can’t snowboard [at a competitive level] if you don’t have the experience of riding a massive mountain,” Mattes said. “I just really wanted to get used to all different terrain.”
That led him to Vermont, and winter weekend trips to the Green Mountain State became a regular occurrence.
Mattes received significant support from his mother, Gina, who was enthusiastic about her son’s hobby.
“If the kids ask me to do something, I’m all about it,” she said. “He just really, really liked it.”
On one extended Christmas-week excursion, a fellow snowboarder at the resort noticed AJ Mattes’ talent and told Gina about the Mount Snow Academy, which would help him train during the winter months. After meeting with school administrators and applying, AJ got accepted, and the family had to make a decision.
Sending him to board in Vermont for part of the year and essentially start a new life would cost tens of thousands of dollars. But after some thought, Gina — a single mom and CEO of a laboratory — wanted to let her son live out his dream.
“I was like, sure, what the heck. You only live once,” she said.
So, AJ split his time between there and Crestwood Middle School for two years, ramping up his training in the winter.
When it came time to enroll in high school, AJ wanted to stay in Vermont and went to the Stratton Mountain School, which also specializes in training winter sport athletes.
“I don’t think he really wanted to be here [in Frederick], not because of me or his friends, but because he loved the snow,” Gina said. “He loved that whole community. You know, everybody’s wearing a hat with their hair hanging out. … But they have their own thing going up there. And he just loved that.”
While there, AJ Mattes began competing in USA Snowboard and Freeski Association-sanctioned events in 2019. His specialty is slopestyle — a type of snowboarding that is run on an obstacle course-like downhill and features jumps and rails.
It’s perfect for Mattes’ flashy style, and before long, he began finishing top-3 at his age group in regional competitions. It earned him a few invites to national events, and he finally broke into the top 10 at his level in April at Copper Mountain in Colorado.
At that competition, he became enamored with the huge peaks in the Rocky Mountains and saw potential in himself on the national circuit.
“It’s more snow, more intense terrain, and bigger and better build features,” Mattes said. “Going to nationals really showed me that I could go somewhere in snowboarding.”
So, Mattes wanted to move west and find a school that increased the intensity of his training. Fortunately for Mattes, he didn’t have to go far to find his next coach.
At that tournament, he met Nick Poplawski, known to his riders as Pops. Poplawski is one of the coaches of the Park City Ski and Snowboard team, and Mattes had already planned to reach out to inquire about joining that club.
PCSS had a tent in the sponsor village at Copper Mountain, and the two struck up a conversation.
“Pretty much right off the bat, I was like, ‘Oh yeah, this totally lines up with exactly what you guys are looking for.’ And I’m always looking to work with new riders with a ton of potential,” Poplawski said.
A few months later, Mattes was in the snowboarding hotbed of Park City, Utah.
Over the summer and first few weeks of fall, Poplawski works his students on trampolines to simulate jumps and increase their air awareness. It’s akin to gymnastics training, and for Mattes and others, the goal is to translate that to snowboarding.
“We’ve been taking a lot of traditional trampoline gymnastics style stuff and kind of putting snowboard flair to it. And that’s something he got a grasp of pretty quickly,” Poplawski said.
That training ramped up this month, as Mattes and other PCSS riders left Oct. 4 for a three-week trip to Banger Park in Austria. It’s Mattes’ first time on the continent, and he’ll be jumping at one of the world’s premier facilities.
He said he hopes to land a backside 1080 while there, which would be his first time successfully pulling off a jump with three full rotations. In addition, Poplawski wants Mattes to learn a double cork this season — where the rider flips and spins twice in the same maneuver — while refining his single flips and rail-riding technique.
“He’s really good at making really challenging things look, frankly, just super casual,” Poplawski said. “And that’s something with young riders that you don’t see a ton of the time.”
So, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Mattes master those tricks this year. He’s progressed quickly and appears to continue that upward trajectory.
That’s thanks to his relaxed mindset when he rides down the mountain. He puts his earbuds in at the start of every run, ready to get in a groove.
All he needs is a good tune.
Mattes | 2022-10-18T05:22:39Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Flair in rare air: Frederick native AJ Mattes, 16, has taken snowboarding to the sport's hotbed in Utah | Recreational | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/recreational/flair-in-rare-air-frederick-native-aj-mattes-16-has-taken-snowboarding-to-the-sports/article_7150e767-c6d3-51f1-996a-21486be46b63.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/recreational/flair-in-rare-air-frederick-native-aj-mattes-16-has-taken-snowboarding-to-the-sports/article_7150e767-c6d3-51f1-996a-21486be46b63.html |
Tickets for the Monday through Thursday films are $7 for adults and $6 for ages 25 and under and 60 and up. “Rocky Horror” tickets are $20 for adults and $15 for ages 25 and under and 60 and up. Get tickets and more information at carrollcountyartscouncil.org, or call 410-848-7272. The Carroll Arts Center is at 91 W. Main St., Westminster.
‘Dracula’ — 7:30 p.m. Oct. 24
The dashing, mysterious Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi), after hypnotizing a British soldier, Renfield (Dwight Frye), travels to London and takes up residence in an old castle. Soon, he begins to wreak havoc, sucking the blood of young women and turning them into vampires. When he sets his sights on Mina (Helen Chandler), the daughter of a prominent doctor, vampire-hunter Van Helsing (Edward Van Sloan) is enlisted to put a stop to the count’s never-ending bloodlust. 1931, NR.
‘Scooby-Doo’ — 7:30 p.m. Oct. 25
Two years after a clash of egos forced Mystery Inc. to close its doors, Scooby-Doo and his clever crime-solving cohorts Fred (Freddie Prinze Jr.), Daphne (Sarah Michelle Gellar), Shaggy (Matthew Lillard) and Velma (Linda Cardellini) are individually summoned to Spooky Island to investigate a series of paranormal incidents at the ultra-hip Spring Break hot spot. 2002, PG.
‘Friday the 13th’ — 7:30 p.m. Oct. 26
Crystal Lake’s history of murder doesn’t deter counselors from setting up a summer camp in the woodsy area. The fresh-faced young people — Jack (Kevin Bacon), Alice (Adrienne King), Bill (Harry Crosby), Marcie (Jeannine Taylor) and Ned (Mark Nelson) — pay little heed to the warnings of locals and soon find themselves stalked by a brutal killer, struggling to stay alive against a merciless opponent. 1980, R.
‘It’ — 7:30 p.m. Oct. 27
Seven young outcasts in Derry, Maine, are about to face their worst nightmare — an ancient, shape-shifting evil that emerges from the sewer every 27 years to prey on the town’s children. Banding together over the course of one horrifying summer, the friends must overcome their own personal fears to battle the murderous, bloodthirsty clown known as Pennywise. 2017, R.
‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show’ — 10 p.m. Oct. 28
When Brad and Janet’s (Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon) car breaks down, they take shelter at the mansion of the bizarre Dr. Frank-n-Furter (Tim Curry). Don those fishnets and stiletto heels and brush up on your “Time Warp” steps for this annual late night screening of the cult classic. Fans with the best get-ups will be awarded special prizes. Pre-packaged audience interaction kits can be ordered in advance for $5 and picked up at the door. The kits contain all the props needed to interact with the movie, and a card explaining when to use them. Outside props will not be permitted. Patron Passes are not accepted for this film. 1975, R.
Carroll Arts Center | 2022-10-18T17:40:39Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Celebrate spooky season with classic horror films | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/celebrate-spooky-season-with-classic-horror-films/article_7ce3886e-48b4-55e9-a09f-ecf88a9c9216.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/celebrate-spooky-season-with-classic-horror-films/article_7ce3886e-48b4-55e9-a09f-ecf88a9c9216.html |
State Sen. Paul Corderman
Sen. Paul Corderman said he wants to retain his position in the Maryland State House to keep pushing for economic development and job opportunities in Western Maryland.
Corderman, who started his political career on the Hagerstown City Council in 2016, is running to continue representing District 2 in the state Senate.
Gov. Larry Hogan appointed Corderman to the seat in August 2020, after it was vacated by then-Sen. Andrew Serafini.
The governor also appointed Corderman to the Maryland House of Delegates in 2017 after appointing then-Del. Brett Wilson to the Washington County Circuit Court. About a year later, Corderman was elected to the same seat.
Corderman, a Republican, was unopposed this year in his primary election race for the District 2 Senate seat. In the Nov. 8 general election, he is facing Democrat Shawn Demetrious Perry, a former Frederick police officer.
In May, before the July primary, Corderman filed a petition with the Washington County Circuit Court, challenging Perry’s residency in District 2 and asking that he be disqualified.
When Perry initially filed to run in District 2, he listed a Maugansville-area address as his residence, according to The Herald-Mail. Though that house used to be in District 2, it was in District 1 when the new legislative map was enacted.
Perry later changed his residence to a Hagerstown home in District 2 that his fiancée owns — three days before the deadline, according to The Herald-Mail.
Corderman’s legal team argued that Perry could not have two addresses. A Circuit Court judge on May 27 ruled that Perry took the necessary steps to change his residency to a District 2 address.
“We respect the court’s decision because I believe in our criminal justice system and in our laws and in our courts,” Corderman said. “We disagree with it, but we do respect it.”
Corderman’s father, John Corderman, served in the Maryland Senate from 1975 to 1978. The younger Corderman said he never envisioned following in his dad’s footsteps when he ran for City Council.
“As I tell folks,” he said, “I’m just an individual who was born and raised in Western Maryland, cares deeply about the people, the issues, and really wants to champion and be their voice for the things that are most important to them.”
During the last legislative session, Corderman introduced seven bills in the state Senate. Two were enacted after the governor signed them.
One, SB665, expanded the recreational hunting and fishing opportunities offered by a Chesapeake Bay Trust program that supports veterans' groups in providing healing and therapeutic services, outdoor recreation, community engagement and green jobs training.
The other, SB911, changed the procedure the Maryland Stadium Authority must follow in issuing bonds to finance the Hagerstown Multi-Use Sports and Events Facility.
Since taking state office, Corderman said, he’s been able to help bring about $150 million of investments back to Western Maryland.
Last year, he cosponsored SB474, which established the Senator George C. Edwards Fund — a multi-million-dollar pot of money meant to help improve economic conditions in the region through grants and loans provided to capital infrastructure and business development projects.
He pointed to Hitachi Rail choosing a site near Hagerstown to build a factory as a major victory for Western Maryland. Leaders in the region need to continue pushing to bring jobs to the area, Corderman said, including in fields like research and development and cybersecurity.
“When individuals are graduating from colleges, and they’re looking for opportunities, and those opportunities aren’t there,” he said, “we lose our young people.”
Name: Paul Corderman
Occupation: Maryland state senator and small-business owner
Previous campaigns/offices: Hagerstown City Council (2016-17), Maryland House of Delegates (2017-20)
Campaign website: www.paulcorderman.com
Social media: Facebook: www.facebook.com/SenatorCorderman; Instagram: www.instagram.com/senator_corderman
Hagerstown City Council
John Corderman | 2022-10-19T01:19:10Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Corderman wants to continue pushing for opportunities in Western Maryland | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/corderman-wants-to-continue-pushing-for-opportunities-in-western-maryland/article_2abc6147-0ec4-5320-a53d-a6abc568fd0d.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/corderman-wants-to-continue-pushing-for-opportunities-in-western-maryland/article_2abc6147-0ec4-5320-a53d-a6abc568fd0d.html |
Dr. Carmen Gill Bailey, medical director for the Frederick Department of Housing and Human Services, speaks at a community engagement summit Tuesday at New Spire Stages.
Ericka Rohrbaugh, assistant director of human services of the Frederick Department of Housing and Human Services, speaks at a community engagement summit Tuesday at New Spire Stages.
Ramenta Cottrell, director of the Frederick Department of Housing and Human Services, speaks at a community engagement summit Tuesday at New Spire Stages.
Housing and Human Services department hopes to create mobile health care unit
The city of Frederick’s Department of Housing and Human Services hopes to create a mobile health care unit and improve outreach to people in immediate danger of homelessness, among other goals.
Leaders in the department outlined the programs they currently provide and discussed plans for the future at a Housing and Human Services community engagement summit on Tuesday morning.
Nonprofit leaders in Frederick attended, along with county representatives, business leaders and other community members.
Although many of the services now encompassed by Housing and Human Services have been around in the city for a while, the department itself is relatively new.
About two years ago, the city created the department by combining Frederick Community Action Agency services and a housing program.
The first step for moving the new department forward, said Housing and Human Services Director Ramenta Cottrell, was building a leadership team and staff.
Today, the department’s workforce includes about 70 people, four assistant directors and a medical director. Many members of the leadership team — except Michele Ott, assistant director of the Community Action Agency, who has been with the agency since 1995 — are new to city government.
The department wants to build more partnerships in the Frederick community with business leaders and nonprofits, Cottrell said.
“We’re really focusing upon ‘Are there any gaps that we can fill?’” she said, “whether we’re doing it ourselves, or whether we’re supporting another organization in some way, shape or form to make that happen.”
Though Housing and Human Services expects to keep most of its offices where they are now, it plans to eventually bring a location to the Golden Mile, Cottrell said. Next year, the department hopes to establish a temporary office on the city’s west side while it determines what a permanent center should look like.
The department is in the preliminary planning stages of bringing a mobile health care unit to the Frederick community, said Dr. Carmen Gill Bailey, medical director for Housing and Human Services.
“While we are downtown, and we do think we’re positioned in the right place, we recognize that there are other parts of the city and other communities that we serve that the downtown center perhaps is not reaching,” she said. “That’s incredibly important for our larger efforts around health equity and building a healthier Frederick, a healthier community all around.”
This year, the Housing and Human Services budget is about $14 million, Cottrell said. Of that, about $1.5 million is from the city. The rest is from grants.
As department leaders develop a strategic plan, which they hope to have in place by next year, Cottrell said, they will discuss how to sustain some department programs without grants or taxpayer money.
Following comments from officials, members of the audience asked department leaders questions.
Melissa Muntz, executive director of the Student Homelessness Initiative Partnership of Frederick County, and Ana Mejia, a community liaison for Frederick High School, asked what the department is doing to improve crisis housing resources.
“Unfortunately, many of our organizations are not crisis services,” Muntz said. “We can house a student if we have two weeks to do it. We can’t always house a student that day.”
The department can place people in motels over the weekend as a short-term solution to their housing insecurity, then have case managers follow up on Monday, Ott said.
But, Cottrell added, Housing and Human Services is still determining the best way to find housing quickly for people in crisis.
“We know for a fact we haven’t figured that out. We don’t have an answer to that question,” she said. “Those are the kind of ideas that we need to know over this next year. Where are the gaps that, to Melissa’s point, maybe nobody else is equipped to [close].”
“So, we need those ideas.”
Ramenta Cottrell
Housing And Human Services
Michele Ott | 2022-10-19T01:19:28Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Housing and Human Services department hopes to create mobile health care unit | Health | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/housing-and-human-services-department-hopes-to-create-mobile-health-care-unit/article_f6c54856-0e42-58b0-ac7c-16322341bcd5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/housing-and-human-services-department-hopes-to-create-mobile-health-care-unit/article_f6c54856-0e42-58b0-ac7c-16322341bcd5.html |
William Wivell
With new constituents, Wivell has clear path back to Annapolis
Even as he continues to hit the campaign trail and talk to voters, William Wivell isn't sweating the results of November's election.
Seeking his second full term as a delegate from Washington County whose district was recently redrawn to include parts of northern Frederick County, Wivell is virtually assured a seat in the House when it convenes in January.
Wivell is one of two Republicans running for two seats in District 2A, along with William Valentine, after a four-person race in the Republican primary. No Democrats are running in the Nov. 8 general election.
The redrawn district stretches across northern Frederick County and eastern Washington County from the Pennsylvania line to the Potomac River.
Wivell served as a Washington County commissioner from December 1998 to December 2010, and again from December 2014 to March 2015.
He was appointed to a seat in the House of Delegates with 29 days left in the session, leaving him to scramble to catch up with the details of bills that already had rounds of committee hearings before they arrived on the floor for a vote.
It took time to adjust to the rhythm of the chamber, and to learn an important truth about working in the General Assembly.
“Annapolis is really about building relationships,” he said.
After the November election, he'll work on strengthening his relationships with the members of the Frederick County delegation. He said he already knows Frederick County lawmakers from their work representing neighboring counties.
The parts of his district in Washington and Frederick counties share a rural, agricultural background, and transportation is a common concern in both counties, he said.
While Interstate 81 in Washington County has been a focus of his work, the state also needs to look at Interstate 70, he said.
The pressure for growth is stronger in Frederick County than in Washington, but drivers in both places spend “a lot of time wasted sitting still,” he said.
He would like to see Interstate 270 expanded, but without the toll lanes supported by Gov. Larry Hogan. Wivell said roads are one of government's core responsibilities.
Like other Republicans in Annapolis, Wivell must balance sticking to his conservative principles with the need to work with the Democratic majority to get things accomplished.
A member of the Environment and Transportation Committee and some of its subcommittees, Wivell said he's found that the chairs of the various bodies have been respectful of their Republican members, offering them a chance to make amendments to legislation during the committee process.
Wivell said he expects education, public safety, and abortion to be key issues during this year's session.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought a lot of information to light about what was and wasn't being taught in schools, which has concerned a lot of parents, he said.
He said he's offered legislation in the last two sessions for education savings accounts that would allow some education funding to follow students, no matter which school they choose to attend.
On abortion, Wivell said he supports allowing exceptions in any abortion ban for cases of rape, incest, or when the life of a mother is at stake.
He's working to draft a bill to provide help for mothers who believe abortion is their only option, but said it's too early in the drafting process to know what the bill would look like.
Name: William Wivell
Hometown: Smithsburg
Previous campaigns/offices: Former Washington County commissioner; member of House of Delegates since 2015.
Campaign website: www.williamwivell.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/delegatewilliamwivell
Email: delegatewivell@gmail.com | 2022-10-19T01:19:34Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | With new constituents, Wivell has clear path back to Annapolis | | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/with-new-constituents-wivell-has-clear-path-back-to-annapolis/article_7b5e3ebd-f4a5-558d-b21a-535419548506.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/with-new-constituents-wivell-has-clear-path-back-to-annapolis/article_7b5e3ebd-f4a5-558d-b21a-535419548506.html |
The Frederick County Council met Tuesday at Winchester Hall with an agenda that included a discussion of the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan. The council voted unanimously to postpone a decision on the plan.
People wearing Sugarloaf Alliance shirts attended a Frederick County Council meeting on Tuesday at Winchester Hall for a discussion of the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan. The council voted unanimously to postpone a decision on the plan.
Frederick County Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer speaks during a Frederick County Council meeting at Winchester Hall on Tuesday. The meeting included a discussion of the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan. The council voted unanimously to postpone a decision on the plan.
Frederick County Council postpones final vote on Sugarloaf plan
The Frederick County Council unanimously voted to postpone its decision on a plan to preserve Sugarloaf Mountain and its surrounding area during a meeting Tuesday, when it was expected to issue the final vote in a two-and-a-half-year process.
The council now is scheduled to vote on the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan on Oct. 25. The county held its first public meeting for the plan in February 2020.
The extra week will grant council members time to consider changes to the plan in hopes of garnering the votes necessary to pass it while also appeasing Stronghold, the nonprofit organization that owns Sugarloaf Mountain.
Four votes are required for the seven-member council to pass the plan.
Since August, Stronghold lawyers and its board of trustees members have said the organization would close the mountain to the public if the County Council passed a version of the plan that Stronghold disagreed with.
Stronghold’s board of trustees requested in August that the County Council remove the organization’s land from an overlay zoning district in the plan that is meant to restrict development.
Tim Goodfellow, the lead county planner for the Sugarloaf plan, said the overlay district wouldn’t change the uses allowed on Stronghold’s land.
Numerous people who spoke in the public comment periods during Tuesday's meeting called on council members to have a "backbone" and vote to approve Sugarloaf plan in spite of Stronghold's threat to close the mountain.
Stronghold owns about 3,400 acres in the Sugarloaf area, all of which were included in the overlay that covers nearly the entire 20,000-acre plan area.
Councilman Kai Hagen, D, the council member most outspoken in favor of the plan, proposed what he said would be a "compromise" for council members who, like him, want to pass the plan in its current form and those who want to appease Stronghold, so the mountain remains open to the public.
"It would be great if we would pass the plan and the full overlay zone the way it is now," Hagen said. "But I know there are not four votes for that."
Hagen and Councilman Jerry Donald, D, were the only council members who made clear they would have voted for the plan on Tuesday.
Under Hagen's proposal, land that is zoned for Resource Conservation, which allows for low-intensity land uses and activities compatible with resource preservation, and which Hagen said is the county's most strict zoning classification, would be exempt from the overlay restrictions.
The vast majority of Stronghold's land is zoned Resource Conservation. The organization's Resource Conservation land would be exempt from the overlay restrictions if the council votes to pass the plan next week.
Any change in zoning, though, would subject the land to the overlay restrictions, Hagen said.
Councilmen Jerry Donald, D, and Steve McKay, R, both called on Stronghold to let the council know whether they would abide by the proposed compromise and keep the mountain open.
It's "critical" that the current council vote to pass the plan, Hagen said.
If the council does not vote on the plan next week, then the version of the plan that the Planning Commission sent the council in July will take effect.
This would effectively undo the council's work on the plan over the last four months.
"We've made a lot of changes and a lot of compromises," Hagen said.
Earlier this month, the council voted to uphold the plan’s eastern boundary along Interstate 270, historically a divider between preservation and development in the southern part of the county and among the most contentious parts of the plan.
The council also voted to remove 114 of 163 zoning changes to individual properties in the plan.
The 114 zoning changes would have been from an “Agricultural” designation to “Resource Conservation.” Land owners had for months said the zoning changes would strip them of their property rights and devalue their land.
The council could also vote to remand the plan back to the planning commission. Doing so would leave a vote to the next council, which will take office in December.
Councilman Phil Dacey, R, has repeatedly said that the council should remand the plan back to the Planning Commission, which held about a dozen meetings on the plan between September 2021 and July 2022.
Heading into Tuesday's meeting and expecting a vote on the plan, Stronghold's board of trustees and lawyers representing the organization were exploring what steps they would have to take to close the mountain, John Webster, president of the board of trustees, said in a phone interview with the News-Post.
Webster said Stronghold has reached out to the Frederick County Sheriff's Office to ask about steps the organization could take to close the mountain to the public.
Sheriff's Office spokesman Todd Wivell said that Stronghold and the Sheriff's Office have not had any formal discussions about how the Sheriff's Office could assist Stronghold in closing the mountain. The Sheriff's Office has not received a formal request for assistance from Stronghold, either, he said.
If Stronghold were to send a formal request, the Sheriff's Office would need to determine the ways it could help the organization keep people off the mountain, Wivell said.
Kai Hagen
Ok. I’ll start…
Hey Jack, who’s on the Stronghold board?
Everybody is bending over backward to ‘appease’ them. Who are they? | 2022-10-19T03:02:34Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Frederick County Council postpones final vote on Sugarloaf plan | Sugarloaf | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/frederick-county-council-postpones-final-vote-on-sugarloaf-plan/article_648d8423-12c0-5120-ae98-af94ec14e6a5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/frederick-county-council-postpones-final-vote-on-sugarloaf-plan/article_648d8423-12c0-5120-ae98-af94ec14e6a5.html |
A man was ordered on Tuesday to serve 10 years in prison for sexually abusing a minor.
Garzone’s attorney, Mary Drawbaugh, appealed to Frederick County Circuit Court Judge Julie Stevenson Solt to sentence Garzone below the guidelines or give him home detention, so he can continue with rehabilitative programs that he started in January 2020.
“He’s been trying to get better,” Drawbaugh said.
But Assistant State’s Attorney Lindsey Carpenter said that the abuse happened while Garzone was seeking treatment for an addiction. She said the addiction is part of what caused him to offend.
“The therapy is a result of being caught,” she said.
“I take full responsibility,” he said. “I am remorseful and regretful.”
Garzone’s wife, Rebecca, was among those who spoke on his behalf. She said he was humbled and is repentant.
“Everyone is eager for him to come home,” she told Solt.
“Mr. Garzone, you are not a monster,” Solt said. “What you have done is a monstrous thing, but that does not make you a monster.”
Man pleads guilty to sex abuse of minor, awaits sentencing
A man pleaded guilty to one count of sex abuse of a minor last Wednesday as part of a plea agreement, officials said in an email Tuesday.
Charles Patrick Garzone | 2022-10-19T03:02:37Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | New Market man ordered to serve 10 years in prison for abusing minor | Courts | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/courts/new-market-man-ordered-to-serve-10-years-in-prison-for-abusing-minor/article_ed618eea-1f61-53c5-94c3-d3aa93f064d7.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/courts/new-market-man-ordered-to-serve-10-years-in-prison-for-abusing-minor/article_ed618eea-1f61-53c5-94c3-d3aa93f064d7.html |
In the absence of injured quarterback Carson Wentz, Washington Commanders coach Ron Rivera will turn to Taylor Heinicke instead of Sam Howell for Sunday’s game against the Green Bay Packers. Rivera could have tapped Howell, giving the third-string rookie a chance to show what he can do at the NFL level, but on Tuesday afternoon, Rivera explained that, right now, Heinicke “gives us the best opportunity to be successful.”
“We’re still in a good situation, still early in the year,” Rivera said. “We like what we’ve got in terms of the skill sets and in terms of our playmakers, guys that we believe we can get the ball to. And we don’t want to put Sam in a [difficult] situation ... this early in his career. We feel he is a young man that as he grows and develops, he’s got a chance.”
Wentz, who underwent surgery on his fractured right ring finger Monday in Los Angeles, may end up missing several games, but for now, Rivera said, the timeline for his return is unclear. Wentz plans to stay in L.A. for several days to rehab with his doctors, who will evaluate him again at the end of the week.
Wentz posted on Instagram about his surgery Tuesday. “Another opportunity to grow and focus on God’s plan, not my own!” he wrote. “Surgery went great yesterday and I’ll attack rehab with everything I have because that’s all I know how to do!”
“If we ever got into an extreme emergency, he’s a guy we believe could learn and learn very quickly,” Rivera said.
Rivera’s choice of Heinicke over Howell seems rooted in the belief that, even at 2-4, Washington can resurrect its season. Rivera said not turning to Howell isn’t an indictment of his development — “We think he’s on track” — but there are still things the rookie needs to learn.
In the locker room Tuesday, Howell praised Wentz and Heinicke for helping him grow since the draft. He said their insights on preparation, watching film and identifying the structures of opposing defenses before the snap have been the most helpful. He didn’t think his routine would change now that he is officially the backup.
Howell seemed confident that if he had to play, he would be better than he was in the preseason. In parts of three games, he finished 43-of-69 (62.3 percent) for 547 yards, one touchdown and one interception. He took nine sacks. In the preseason opener, he had an impressive late-game showing, rushing for two touchdowns in the final nine minutes against Carolina.
The key to his growth, he said, is footwork. In college, Howell played in an air raid offense and was always in shotgun, always taking a three-step drop.
If Howell gets into a game, he would be the eighth quarterback to take a snap in two-plus seasons under Rivera. Though the coach probably hopes he doesn’t have to use Howell, the rookie is now just one play away — and he is confident that, if called upon, he could excel. | 2022-10-19T04:42:40Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Why Taylor Heinicke, not Sam Howell, will start in place of Carson Wentz | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/why-taylor-heinicke-not-sam-howell-will-start-in-place-of-carson-wentz/article_3cdf0c47-1dd8-5ddc-b6bd-52e0b5a1a076.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/why-taylor-heinicke-not-sam-howell-will-start-in-place-of-carson-wentz/article_3cdf0c47-1dd8-5ddc-b6bd-52e0b5a1a076.html |
State Senate, District 2: Paul D. Corderman
Name: Paul D. Corderman
Where you live: Hagerstown
Current occupation and employers (may also list up to two previous jobs you’ve held); if retired, list your last job and employer: Small-business owner
Political experience (public offices held and when; as well as unsuccessful campaigns for office and which years; do not include political party positions): Hagerstown City Council, 2016-2017; Maryland House of Delegates, 2017-2020; Maryland Senate, 2020-present
website: www.paulcorderman.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SenatorCorderman
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/senator_corderman
I was born and raised in Washington County, so I understand the challenges our communities face. I care deeply about our community, our state, and our country. I see the value in taking ownership in the area in which you live. I don’t just want to be a consumer, but rather a contributor, and I’ve displayed my capability over the last five years in public service by bringing investments back from Annapolis to Western Maryland.
I believe the most important issue spreads across the entire state and that is reducing the cost of living, lowering inflation, and preventing additional increases in taxes for Marylanders. Recently, we have seen inflation increase significantly. I have fought and will continue to fight any effort to increase the tax burdens on hardworking families and will do everything I can to keep the money of Frederick County citizens in their own pockets.
3 – What experience (work, political or other) has prepared you to hold this office? (100 words max)
As a small-business owner, husband and father, I understand the burdens facing everyday Marylanders — inflation, increase in crime, tax hikes, concern over the quality of education in public schools, etc. I want to provide opportunities for every person living in Frederick County by empowering them to make decisions that lead to a prosperous life. I’m proud to have a record of achievement during my time in both the House of Delegates and State Senate. If re-elected, I’ll continue to build upon that success and be a voice for Frederick County in Annapolis.
4 – What is one major issue the current state Senate has handled poorly and what would have done differently? (100 words max)
Our state legislature has unfortunately decriminalized certain offenses to the extreme. Many Marylanders have lost their sense of security due to an increase in violent crime and a lack of consequences for criminals. Those who continue to wreak havoc on our communities must be held accountable. We must crack down on violent crime, restore law and order in our communities, and strengthen the tools that the courts need to keep dangerous offenders off our streets.
Maryland is experiencing a primary care physician shortage, which has caused a barrier in our state to access quality health care. We have had, and are continuing to have, conversations with the state to open new opportunities to train future Doctors. For example, Meritus Medical Center will be opening a new school of osteopathic medicine, which will help address this shortage, training hundreds of new doctors in our communities. I am proud to support this project as the benefits will be felt by citizens in Frederick County and throughout Western Maryland.
The extreme decriminalization that has occurred in our state over the last several years has made us a much less safer state than we were previously. We must get back to treating criminals as criminals and holding them accountable for their actions. Repeat violent offenders must face mandatory jail time. I was proud to cosponsor legislation in the past to hold criminals accountable and will continue to do so in the future. No one should feel unsafe in their own home. We must take action to bring that sense of security back to communities throughout the state.
Maryland is often referred to as a miniature America, with our beaches on the Eastern Shore to the mountains of Western Maryland. We are home to beautiful natural habitats and wildlife that are critical to a thriving ecosystem, which we have prioritized to protect. Balancing that protection along with investments in future technologies will be essential to the long term health of our environment.
Infrastructure improvements are a core responsibility of our governments, which include the widening of our highways and the replacement of our bridges. I-270 and I-495, to include the American Legion Bridge, along with I-81, must be widened, as all are severely over capacity, causing a significant risk to the public that utilizes them. The gridlock on these roadways will certainly get worse if they are not addressed in the near future. | 2022-10-19T06:20:24Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | State Senate, District 2: Paul D. Corderman | 2022 Primary Voters Guide | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/2022_primary_voters_guide/state-senate-district-2-paul-d-corderman/article_cbd89311-7aff-5148-aa3e-15c9103f29ea.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/2022_primary_voters_guide/state-senate-district-2-paul-d-corderman/article_cbd89311-7aff-5148-aa3e-15c9103f29ea.html |
The increasingly bitter dispute between the Frederick County government and the union that represents the county’s career firefighters has again gotten to the stage of unfounded political attacks.
The union is campaigning hard to defeat ballot Question A and, as it did in a similar campaign four years ago, is spreading a misleading message.
Its slogan in this campaign is “Keep Frederick County Safe,” but the charter amendment in Question A has nothing to do with safety. It is about who has the power to decide how tax dollars must be spent.
Should the power rest with officials elected by the voters to the County Council, or with an unelected arbitrator in bargaining disputes between the county and its career firefighters? The amendment would make it clear that the County Council has the final say.
In 2018, the firefighters’ union succeeded in passing an earlier charter amendment called Question D with campaign literature telling voters “Support Your Local Firefighters.” Their literature did not explain that the change would allow an arbitrator to tell the county executive how much to pay firefighters. Nearly 73% of the vote was in favor of that amendment.
But the county attorney ruled that the County Council was not bound by the arbitrator’s ruling and it had the authority to decrease a contract amount. The union sued the county in 2020, arguing the charter change should be binding on the county government, including the County Council, but a judge dismissed its case.
The council then decided to put the clarifying language before the voters, rather than engage in legal battles with the union. That is how we ended up with Question A.
Most of the noise is being made by the union, aleeging “misuse of public funds” and “unethical behavior” by the county for creating a committee to drum up public support for the ballot question.
Stephen Jones, president of the Career Firefighters Association of Frederick County, called on the council to investigate the county’s “misuse of public funds” for the ballot issue committee. He added in a news release: “We intend to file with the appropriate bodies to shed light on this unethical behavior.”
County spokeswoman Vivian Laxton wrote in an email on behalf of County Executive Jan Gardner that “the county has an obligation to inform the public about ballot initiatives and their implication for county taxpayers, in this instance how it could impact the county’s budget.”
The union should know that Maryland courts have already ruled that county governments can spend money on such committees to inform voters. The state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, ruled in 2015 that Montgomery County officials were within their rights to use taxpayers’ money to encourage voters to approve a similar ballot question in 2012.
Making baseless charges about misusing public money is just an effort to obscure the issue and confuse voters, and to play on some voters’ distrust of politicians. That is wrong.
The county’s charter gives the County Council the final vote on the county’s budget, which includes the budget for the Division of Fire and Rescue Services. That is as it should be. Spending public money should never be decided by anyone not elected by the voters.
Council Vice President Michael Blue sponsored the bill putting the charter amendment on the ballot. He told the News-Post in July that if voters reject the proposed charter amendment, any future labor dispute with firefighters would be more likely to go to court. And more money would be wasted litigating a question that should have an obvious answer.
The elected County Council — and no one else — has to have final authority over spending. | 2022-10-19T06:21:25Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | County Council should have final say on spending | Editorials | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/editorial/county-council-should-have-final-say-on-spending/article_76b09b9d-a66f-5d8f-b15f-feebba8c85e1.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/editorial/county-council-should-have-final-say-on-spending/article_76b09b9d-a66f-5d8f-b15f-feebba8c85e1.html |
State delegate, District 5: Chris Tomlinson
Name: Chris Tomlinson
Where you live: Melrose, outside Manchester, in Carroll County
Current occupation and employers (may also list up to two previous jobs you’ve held); if retired, list your last job and employer: Manager of the Contracts Division within the Office of Procurement for the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA)
Political experience (public offices held and when; as well as unsuccessful campaigns for office and which years; do not include political party positions): Unsuccessful run for mayor of Manchester, 2015
email: christophertomlinson1@gmail.com
website: https://tomlinsonfordelegate.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/ChrisTomlinsonForDelegate
I’m running for office because I have the energy and experience required to hit the ground running and get to work on day 1. Once elected, I will fight back against tax increases, government overreach, the opioid epidemic, and liberal indoctrination in our schools. As your delegate, I will fight for small businesses, our agricultural heritage, the integrity of our elections, the lives of the unborn, law enforcement, and 2nd Amendment rights.
Stopping Frederick County from becoming Montgomery County. Due to over development, tax increases, and awful county leadership, Frederick has changed significantly over the last decade. I will work hard to see that Frederick County remains a beautiful rural and suburban gateway to Western Maryland, and that it does not become North Montgomery County.
Professionally, I serve in Gov. Hogan’s administration as a manager in state procurement. I have been instrumental in the execution of essential state contracts worth billions of dollars. In the community, I serve in leader positions with my local Lions Club, the Carroll County Historic Preservation Commission, and the North Carroll Business Alliance. As a former opinion columnist for the Carroll County Times for four years, I fought for the community and defended conservative values. I’ve been a conservative activist for over a decade and most recently, served as the 3rd vice chairman of the Maryland Republican Party.
The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future Act. The Commission on Innovation and Excellence in Education, also known as the Kirwan Commission, worked on this legislation for years and this act is nothing more than an education money pit. It increases education funding by $3.8 billion each year over the next 10 years without a way to pay for and it, and without any provisions for accountability. Before spending mandates are imposed on Frederick, the Blueprint should have metrics added to measure progress that is being made to ensure that our taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely.
The most pressing health care issue in Maryland is the opioid and fentanyl epidemic that has devastated our communities. As your state delegate, I plan to pass legislation to crack down on drug dealers and violent criminals, increase access to drug treatment programs for those battling addiction, expand drug prevention education in our schools, and pass “Distribution of Heroin or Fentanyl Resulting in Death” legislation to close loopholes in our law.
Over the last couple years, we have watched the General Assembly do everything they could to neuter law enforcement and destroy their profession. As a delegate, I will fight for our brave men and women in law enforcement and fight back against those who still want to push the incredibly unpopular and ineffective “defund the police” agenda.
The Climate Solutions Now Act of 2022 was passed by the Democrats this year. Gov. Hogan called it a “reckless and controversial energy tax bill” and I agree with him. Under this legislation, the state must now cut its greenhouse gas emissions 60% below 2006 levels by 2031 and eliminate the state’s carbon footprint by 2045. This will make no impact on slowing down climate change across the globe due to Maryland’s size. Instead, Maryland residents and businesses are going to feel the impact as we are forced to modernize our energy systems hoping that this will save the world.
I-270 has caused a lot of traffic congestion for Frederick, especially when 270 hits I-70 and becomes U.S. 15. I support widening 15 through the city of Frederick. I’m thrilled to see that MDOT has included $167.7 million in construction funding in the current draft of the Consolidated Transportation Program to widen 15 from 70 to Md. 26. The governor has some plans of his own to widen 270, but he’s facing a lot of opposition with that plan. I believe that the best solution is to relieve the congestion on 15, just as it enters the city. | 2022-10-19T14:59:29Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | State delegate, District 5: Chris Tomlinson | 2022 Primary Voters Guide | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/2022_primary_voters_guide/state-delegate-district-5-chris-tomlinson/article_5028d69c-23ed-50c5-9ce5-7e6957f1ee64.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/2022_primary_voters_guide/state-delegate-district-5-chris-tomlinson/article_5028d69c-23ed-50c5-9ce5-7e6957f1ee64.html |
Mark Bryan of Hootie and the Blowfish will perform his solo material at the Weinberg Center
Growing up just down the road in Gaithersburg, Mark Bryan listened to a lot of classic rock — Hendrix, Zeppelin, Van Halen — music that would inspire his own career in the music industry.
“My parents were playing good music when I was a kid,” Bryan said during a recent phone interview with 72 Hours.
It was a performance of “My Generation,” in particular, that served as a catalyst for Bryan. The Who performed the song on The King Biscuit Flower Hour, a syndicated radio show that featured performances by rock musicians.
“It was something about the energy of that song that affected me in a way that nothing else had at that point,” Bryan said.
At that pivotal moment, Bryan started learning to play guitar and wanted to write songs of his own.
In the decades since, Bryan has gone on to play with multiple bands, most notably Hootie and the Blowfish, which has sold over 20 million records and won two Grammy Awards.
Bryan will bring his music to the Weinberg Center for the Arts on Oct. 22 with The Screaming Trojans, a mix of musician friends that have known each other for decades. The group’s name is inspired by the local high schools they attended, including Seneca Valley High School (The Screaming Eagles) and Gaithersburg High School (The Trojans).
“These are my buddies from growing up,” Bryan said. “Everyone’s refined their skills, so it is a dream to be playing in a side band with all my friends.”
In his earlier years, Bryan and his classmates and friends would play in various cover bands. His first official gig was playing for a sweet 16 birthday party at the Holiday Inn in Gaithersburg when he was 15. During his senior year of high school, Bryan thought it was a big deal when his band landed the opportunity to play at The Gentry in D.C.
Then it became about writing songs and having something to say and having some purpose behind it, he said.
“That is when I knew it was something I wanted to do for the rest of my life.”
While in college at the University of South Carolina, Bryan was listening to R.E.M., U2 and other ’80s rock. When he became a DJ, his musical tastes broadened even more.
“That is when I discovered that genre is unimportant and good songs is where it is at,” he said.
He also met fellow student Darius Rucker on campus during this time, and they started playing music together, eventually leading to the formation of the band Hootie and the Blowfish.
The two influenced each other musically, Bryan said.
“Darius turned me on to Americana that I still listen to today,” he said. “As a rock guy growing up, I had dismissed country. But I found this alt-country and realized this is some of the best stuff out there. It is about the sincerity in the message.”
Being the guitarist for Hootie and the Blowfish has been a dream come true for Bryan.
“You get to have a career with your best friends, doing what you love. What is considered work is play for us.”
At 55 years old, Bryan still gets to play with his best friends, including Hootie and the Blowfish bassist Dean Felber, who played in a cover band with Bryan in high school. “We’ve been jamming together since we were about 14 or 15 years old.”
Bryan’s solo career has never been about celebrity or money; it has been about staying active when Hootie was in a down time, Bryan said. He has always had more songs that hadn’t seen the light of day, so whenever Hootie would take a break, Bryan would record those songs. He has done that four times now, his most recent album being “Midlife Priceless,” released in 2021.
“It eventually became about what I want to do or what I want to say as a solo artist,” he said.
All of the songs on Bryan’s album were probably pitched for the last Hootie album, he said. Not everything makes the cut.
“It doesn’t mean it is a bad song, but we had like 80 songs to choose from,” he said.
Bryan starts writing each song with the idea that it could end up being a Hootie song, even if it is quite personal, like a song he wrote for his daughter.
“Each song is open to interpretation,” Bryan said. “Sometimes it becomes more personal, but at the same time, I want to have a message that everyone can relate to and that Darius can relate to if he were to sing it. I try to keep my message universal, but sometimes you have to sing about what’s personal in order to relate to people. … That’s a delicate balance.”
Bryan says his best songs just come to him.
“I can be intentional about it. I can sit down in a room with people and write a song about a topic. My favorite stuff comes out of the ether, when I am in the shower or when I am driving. There is no rhyme or reason to it.”
The idea behind “Midlife Priceless” is to enjoy whatever point you are at in your life, whatever age.
He will perform some of its songs, as well as renditions of Hootie and the Blowfish songs, at his Frederick show with The Screaming Trojans, who have played Frederick twice before — once at Flying Dog Brewery and again at Frederick’s 4th at Baker Park.
“I want to feel something from the music I listen to,” Bryan said, “and I want others to feel something from the music I make.”
Mark Bryan and The Screaming Trojans
Michael Heister, from Buckeystown, will open the show. Heister is a student at the University of Maryland and a son of Kevin Heister, a member of The Screaming Trojans. Musicians from Frederick’s Let There Be Rock School will also perform.
Where: Weinberg Center for the Arts, 20 W. Patrick St., Frederick | 2022-10-19T17:09:47Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Mark Bryan of Hootie and the Blowfish will perform his solo material at the Weinberg Center | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/mark-bryan-of-hootie-and-the-blowfish-will-perform-his-solo-material-at-the-weinberg/article_66a7af69-a84d-54b9-a921-95f23ad25496.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/mark-bryan-of-hootie-and-the-blowfish-will-perform-his-solo-material-at-the-weinberg/article_66a7af69-a84d-54b9-a921-95f23ad25496.html |
Other Voices Theatre artistic director Steve Cairns stands for a portrait at the theater in Frederick on Oct. 5.
Artistic director Steve Cairns sits for a portrait at Other Voices Theatre on Oct. 5.
Artistic director Steve Cairns stands for a portrait at Other Voices Theatre on Oct. 5.
Other Voices Theatre artistic director Steve Cairns finds his home on the community theater stage
At 6 years old, Steve Cairns landed his first role, as Oliver.
It wasn’t his last.
More than five decades later, Cairns serves as artistic director of Other Voices Theatre in Frederick. The Brunswick thespian’s roles at the theater have spanned nine shows, including the Chairman in “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” and Miss Trunchbull in “Matilda.”
Born in Michigan, Cairns received degrees in theater and education from Anderson University in Indiana. He realized he did not want to teach, so he went to work in theater in the Midwest. Cairns then made the leap to Los Angeles, where he honed his craft, taking classes and auditioning for roles.
He went on tour with Bridgework Theatre, then moved to Cleveland and formed North Coast Productions with his sister, producing two musicals.
Then Cairns put his theater career on hold for about 23 years to focus on raising his five children.
“I always missed it,” he admitted.
Cairns returned to theater in 2015 and joined Other Voices Theatre about five years ago.
“I kept hearing all these great things about Other Voices and Susan Thornton,” who served as artistic director prior to Cairns. The two are now close friends, he said.
Years ago, when Cairns heard Other Voices Theatre needed people for its production of “Jesus Christ Superstar,” he submitted a video of himself singing and landed the role of a priest in the musical, his first show with the theater.
Now, as artistic director, his responsibility is to set the vision for Other Voices. He has to think about the theater’s brand and what shows fit it best. Cairns described Other Voices as a family theater, which it does well, but he also thinks it could reach a wider audience. He would like to explore expanding to include more contemporary, edgier theater, perhaps with shows such as “Rent” or “Avenue Q.”
Cairns is also interested in offering directing and playwriting classes to adults.
He lauded Thornton for the strong foundation she set.
“Theater is a community. When you find people you like and you want to try to work with them, you take what you can to work with them,” Cairns said.
Working onstage and behind the scenes over the years, he realized his passion lies in community theater. It is not where you make the big bucks — Cairns has a day job as a recruiting manager for a government contractor — and it’s probably not the place where you’ll get your big break, either.
“You don’t go to community theater ... to be a star,” Cairns said. “You’ll be Frederick famous, maybe, but that’s about it.”
Rather, community theater is the place where you build lasting relationships, Cairns says.
“I’ve done shows all over D.C. in different community theaters. ... I’ve done some professional theater out here as well. But I always kind of come back to Other Voices, because it’s where I’m comfortable, and [these are] the people I love to be around.”
Some actors come and go, so it can be difficult to develop lasting relationships with all of them, but those who stay with the theater company hold a special place in Cairns’ heart.
“These are my best friends here,” he said. “We all care about each other very much.”
Typically, Cairns spends two or three nights a week at Other Voices, but lately, he is there almost every night as director of “The Addams Family,” a musical comedy making its run this month, with remaining shows on Oct. 21, 22 and 23.
After work at his day job on Oct. 5, Cairns came to the theater to prepare for opening weekend. They worked out some kinks with the fog machine and found creative solutions to a complex set design. Overall, Cairns felt pretty good.
“I have really good actors,” he said.
Cairns always wanted to play Gomez but said he was happy to be directing.
John Glymph, who plays Lurch, said Cairns is quite detailed as director.
“It’s a very funny show,” Glymph added. “The music’s great.”
Striding across the stage before rehearsal, Cairns pointed out details in the set. He explained how people contributed to its design. As dancers filed in, he greeted them warmly, then let out a contented sigh. Cairns feels at home on the Other Voices Theatre stage.
“We may never be Broadway,” he said, “but we do some darn good shows.”
Other Voices Theatre presents "The Addams Family"
"The Addams Family" musical comedy depicts a family unlike any other. Director Steve Cairns describes it as a tender, heartwarming tale set in ghoulish terms.
Where: Performing Arts Factory, 244 B S. Jefferson St., Frederick
When: 8 p.m. Oct. 21 and 22, 2 p.m. Oct. 23
Info: 301-662-3722, othervoicestheatre.org/show/addams | 2022-10-20T00:47:29Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Other Voices Theatre artistic director Steve Cairns finds his home on the community theater stage | Theater | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/theater/other-voices-theatre-artistic-director-steve-cairns-finds-his-home-on-the-community-theater-stage/article_8b7147fd-8973-547e-aa6b-a7a0a7a0ada9.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/theater/other-voices-theatre-artistic-director-steve-cairns-finds-his-home-on-the-community-theater-stage/article_8b7147fd-8973-547e-aa6b-a7a0a7a0ada9.html |
An Army specialist veteran and his attorney, Stephen Musselman, appear before Frederick County Circuit Court Judge Scott Rolle in November 2016.
A Maryland District Court judge is studying if Frederick and Washington counties need a court to specialize in criminal cases involving veteran defendants.
Veterans courts are intensive treatment programs that assist veterans accused of crimes — like DUI, theft or possession of drugs — due to substance abuse or mental health problems, said Terri Charles, a Maryland Judiciary spokeswoman.
A specialized court can get veterans help through the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and local organizations, she said.
To gauge if there’s a need for this type of court locally, Maryland District Court Judge Eric Schaffer said through an email from Charles that every person processed by the District Court commissioners in Frederick and Washington counties, which make up District 11, will be surveyed to see if they identify as a veteran.
The process is anticipated to take about three months, he said.
“Judicial resources are limited, and our dockets are very busy,” Schaffer, an Army veteran, said. “Before we devote significant time and effort to such a court, we want to make sure there is sufficient need."
Joshua Marks, 62, of Mount Airy, has been a veteran advocate for five years. More recently, he has pushed for a veterans treatment court in Frederick County and other counties in the state.
He's given presentations on the benefits of veterans treatment courts and garnered letters of support.
Maryland currently has four veterans treatment courts. There is one each in Baltimore City District Court, Anne Arundel District Court and Prince George’s County Circuit Court. There also is a regional veterans court in Dorchester County's District Court, serving Dorchester, Wicomico, Somerset and Worcester counties.
Marks believes the court in Baltimore City is the "gold standard." He wants to give veterans in Frederick County the same opportunity for rehabilitation.
"These guys don't need to be [in the detention center]. It only exacerbates their problem and makes their alcohol or drug abuse or whatever worse because they're not getting treatment for it," Marks said.
In 2016, a quasi-veterans court sprouted in the Frederick County Courthouse. It lasted 10 months. It didn't continue since it didn't have the approval of the Maryland Court of Appeals.
Frederick County Circuit Court submitted an application for the veterans court to continue, but the application was withdrawn, Charles said.
Roughly 10 cases went through the court in 10 months, Frederick County Circuit Court Judge Scott Rolle said. Rolle, an Army veteran, presided over the court.
"It seemed to make much more sense to me to send somebody who was suffering with PTSD or substance abuse that may or may not have been service related to see if we could bring back their military discipline and get them the help they needed, rather than just throwing them in jail," Rolle said.
After the data are collected, Schaffer said in his message through Charles, the District Court can figure out how to proceed based on the numbers.
If there is sufficient need in Frederick County, the District Court can work on a detailed plan for a veterans court, including the personnel and resources involved, said Ken Oldham, CEO and president of United Way of Frederick County.
United Way did preliminary research on veterans treatment courts at the behest of the Frederick County Veterans Advisory Council, Oldham said. United Way went from knowing little about veterans treatment courts to becoming an advocate of them, he said.
"If there is need, then we want to be part of that advocacy to help make the veterans treatment court happen in Frederick County," Oldham said.
Once the plan is complete, the District Court can secure approval for the treatment court from the chief judge of the Court of Appeals, Schaffer said.
The District Court is surveying Washington and Frederick counties to also explore the option of a multicounty court, like the one on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, Schaffer said.
The most popular place for veterans treatment courts is District Court since most criminal cases involving veterans are misdemeanors and not violent, Charles said.
Veterans treatment courts in Circuit Court, Charles said, like the one in Prince George's County, handle veterans who commit felonies due to mental illness and substance abuse.
Schaffer has observed veterans courts and spoken to mentors who assist veterans in the programs.
“I think it’s a terrific idea,” Schaffer said.
Frederick County State’s Attorney Charlie Smith said he supports the idea of focusing on veterans' needs in the criminal justice system. His father is a World War II Marine Corps veteran and his son will attend the United States Military Academy.
"I'm certainly in favor of providing unique services to veterans whose struggle results in criminal behavior," Smith said. | 2022-10-20T00:47:41Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | District judge exploring need for veterans treatment court | Courts | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/courts/district-judge-exploring-need-for-veterans-treatment-court/article_1cf9132e-6ef8-5b8d-903a-269393aeb9e6.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/courts/district-judge-exploring-need-for-veterans-treatment-court/article_1cf9132e-6ef8-5b8d-903a-269393aeb9e6.html |
By Jacob Bogage The Washington Post
The standard deduction — the baseline amount of income that filers can collect tax free — will increase to $13,850 for individuals and $27,700 for married couples.
It is the largest adjustment to deductions since 1985, when the IRS began annual automatic inflationary adjustments.
The tax system changes follow a large cost of living adjustment, or COLA, announced by the Social Security Administration last week to compensate for inflation.
Social Security benefits are set to jump 8.7 percent in 2023, the greatest such increase in four decades.
Several other elements of the tax code also are indexed to inflation.
The maximum 2023 Earned Income Tax Credit, one of the federal government’s main anti-poverty measures, will be $7,430, up from $6,935 in 2022. | 2022-10-20T02:28:38Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | You can keep more money from the IRS next year, thanks to inflation | | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/you-can-keep-more-money-from-the-irs-next-year-thanks-to-inflation/article_e612b475-44af-59f1-89d9-1006c6ff6c14.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/you-can-keep-more-money-from-the-irs-next-year-thanks-to-inflation/article_e612b475-44af-59f1-89d9-1006c6ff6c14.html |
Lead instructor at Round Table Historical Fencing Jacob McDonald stands for a portrait on Aug. 24.
Lead instructor at Round Table Historical Fencing Jacob McDonald poses for a portrait on Aug. 24.
So you think you can sword fight ...
By Gina Gallucci-White Special to the News-Post
While attending the Maryland Renaissance Festival in Crownsville, many of us have looked on from the stands as knights battle each other in staged sword-fighting matches.
For those who want to learn how to swing a real sword and battle an opponent in a safe learning environment, a local Frederick group offers an opportunity to gear up and fight (for real).
Round Table Historical Fencing provides a weekly Sunday class with sparring opportunities in the historical European-style of martial arts training with a focus on the German long sword as a weapon. Founded in 2018, the group was initially called Cymbrogi after the Celtic word for “companions of the heart.” Last year, they moved toward a more community-led model and rebranded as Round Table.
72 Hours reached out to group founder Jacob McDonald to learn more about sword fighting and get some tips straight from a pro.
You don’t need to know about sword fighting to participate.
While martial arts or sports background is helpful, a participant in the group does not need any background knowledge to start sword fighting. “Anybody can do this,” he said. “When you come in here, we go pretty much at the level that you are wanting to.” Group members are going to be at different levels of sparring and they do not expect new members to reach those levels during their first classes.
“We really meet people where they are at and where their comfort is as we go through and explain the basics,” McDonald said. “They get to know how to hold a sword and we don’t even have them start sparring or interacting or fighting with other people until they feel comfortable.”
This is not Live Action Role Playing.
Some people enjoy Live Action Role Playing, or LARPing, as it’s sometimes called, where participants portray fictional characters and perform fight scenes with foam weapons. This group does not do that.
“This is a legit martial art with thrills and techniques and real practice weapons,” McDonald said.
There are three phases of techniques: before, after and simultaneous.
At the beginning of a participant’s training and learning, the focus is on the before- and after-attack hits. Fighters are taught to look at what moves they can do first, such as throwing a cut or learning to thrust the sword. After a strike, they need to focus on ways to stay safe, including recognizing various attack moves and learning ways to block that set them up to make a counter move.
“When you get further into studying the martial art, you start to learn there are techniques that can be done simultaneously where you are attacking and defending at the same time and there are a lot more principles involved as far as the timing, the measure between your opponent and the different positioning of the blade,” he said.
Focus is on defense as much as offense.
McDonald notes participants need to be mindful and protect themselves. “You don’t want to have the focus of ‘how can I hit the other person?’ Yes. That is important, but we really want to focus on how can you survive,” he said. “If you are surviving, then you have more opportunities to be able to hit them.”
Go slow, take your time, and have fun!
Participants are often frustrated at the beginning of training because the techniques are unfamiliar to them.
“These are going to be new ways of moving your body that you are not really used to so it will be frustrating to see,” he said. “You will see other people further along within their understanding of the art, but it is just going to take time, and it is fun. The more consistency that you have with it, you will be able to get there, too.”
Sparring is a great form of exercise.
Group members are usually drenched in sweat after a session, and many lose weight as a result.
“You definitely get stronger,” McDonald said. “All of the long swords are somewhere between 3 to 4 pounds, so moving that in a way where you are constantly attacking and defending, it really gets your cardio going.”
A better understanding of self-defense tactics is a takeaway.
As participants gain a martial mindset, they can better understand self-defense situations.
“What you are doing is constantly working with ‘how am I able to survive the situation when somebody has a weapon that is trying to hurt me?’” he said. “You are able to get comfortable in that situation and know how to protect yourself.”
You don’t need any gear to begin.
The group offers loaner gear, including padded jackets, helmets and long swords, as a way to be a more inclusive environment. “All you need to do is show up and put in the effort and give respect to everybody you are training with, and you are going to have a good time,” McDonald said.
You’ll walk away from each session with a sense of pride.
One of the main things that McDonald hopes all group members take away from sessions is an understanding that they are capable of doing very difficult things.
“Sometimes people have never been in those high-pressure situations and might not have the confidence to do it,” McDonald said, but he’s seen people’s efforts pay off. “You are going to learn that over time if you put your efforts into something consistently, no matter where you start in the beginning, you are able to conquer very difficult things.”
Jacob Mcdonald | 2022-10-20T04:13:55Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | So you think you can sword fight ... | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/so-you-think-you-can-sword-fight/article_b16fd4df-82f9-581b-bbe2-cb9800dbab68.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/so-you-think-you-can-sword-fight/article_b16fd4df-82f9-581b-bbe2-cb9800dbab68.html |
Oakdale’s center and team captain Josh Crummitt breaks a huddle at the football team’s practice at Oakdale High School on Wednesday.
Oakdale’s center and team captain Josh Crummitt prepares to snap the ball during a drill at the football team’s practice at Oakdale High School on Wednesday.
Center of gravity: Despite his low-profile position, Crummitt is Oakdale’s emotional leader
Josh Crummitt found his voice at an early age, realizing its power to help others and assist him in his own pursuits.
“I just like taking charge,” the senior at Oakdale High School said. “Showing people that I can lead them through things and help them out.”
Crummitt has the most powerful voice among all players on the Oakdale football team. He’s the Bears’ captain and emotional leader, even though he plays center — one of the lowest profile positions in the sport.
He’s the one setting the tone in the weight room during summer workouts. He’s the one leading team huddles before, during and after the game. And he’s the one delivering fiery halftime speeches to pull his teammates out of ruts, like he did on Sept. 23 to help Oakdale dig out of a 14-point hole and beat Linganore 28-14.
“He stands up to talk and knows what to say at the right time,” junior quarterback Evan Austin said. “It just makes him a great leader. He gets everyone going. We need a person like Josh.”
Crummitt insists he doesn’t have a preplanned pep talk ready for Friday’s showdown, as the Bears (6-1) play host to unbeaten (7-0) Frederick.
He’ll just get a feel for the moment, like he always does, and let the words flow.
“When I let them know I believe in them, it really gets them going,” Crummitt says of his teammates. “There are certain times you can see it. They need that little push on the back and that little pat on the shoulder to let them know.”
Speaking out in front of others has never been an issue from Crummitt, even at an early age. At times, it was the only way he was going to accomplish his goal.
“If I want something, I am going to go get it,” he said.
Youth football coaches saw a big, outgoing kid who worked hard and paid attention to detail, and felt he would be a perfect fit right in the middle of their offensive line.
“Fourth grade was my first year playing football, and no one knew how to snap the ball,” Crummitt said. “I tried it my first time and was good at it. Right in the quarterback’s chest. So, I kind of just took that role. I was a leader. So, they kind of thought, hey, a guy in the middle, he’ll be able to show the offensive line what to do and where to go.”
In eighth grade, Crummitt stopped playing youth football for Oakdale and started playing for the higher profile Columbia Ravens. That helped generate a little buzz for himself.
Despite being a lifelong resident in the Oakdale school district, he attended private high school at Good Counsel for his freshman and sophomore seasons and half of his junior season.
But the fit wasn’t right for him there, and he wound up enrolling at Oakdale, much to the delight of coach Kurt Stein and his staff.
“Josh, ever since he got here, has been that guy for us,” Stein said. “Guys listen to him and follow him. He helps keep everyone in line. The best team leadership comes from players and not coaches. If they hear from me over and over again, it gets stale. When it’s one of the players, I think it hits home a little harder.”
In many ways, Crummitt’s story mirrors that of his longtime friend and teammate, Chase Haught, a fellow Good Counsel transfer who protects his quarterback’s blind side as the Bears’ right tackle.
The 6-foot-1, 280-pound Crummitt and the 6-2, 285-pound Haught have helped transform Oakdale’s offensive line, a weak spot in previous seasons, into an area of strength this season.
Both have received lower-level Division I offers to play football in college and remain undecided on where they will go.
“He is the heart and soul of the line,” Haught said of Crummitt. “It starts with the center. He is the first person touching the ball. He’s a great leader and a great teammate.”
Stein said the pull of Crummitt’s leadership comes from his work ethic and willingness to do anything that he would ask of someone else.
“You’ve got to have that leader down in the trenches,” Crummitt said. “If you are a center and you are a lineman and you are a leader on the team, it shows the guys that, hey, if he is going to bust his [butt] for you down in the trenches and not really get any spotlight for it, he is going to be there for you, and he is going to be there when times get tough.”
Josh Crummitt
Chase Haught | 2022-10-20T04:14:26Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Center of gravity: Despite his low-profile position, Crummitt is Oakdale’s emotional leader | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/center-of-gravity-despite-his-low-profile-position-crummitt-is-oakdale-s-emotional-leader/article_df1e1cb5-d4a3-588b-90e2-ae4c6bd845eb.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/center-of-gravity-despite-his-low-profile-position-crummitt-is-oakdale-s-emotional-leader/article_df1e1cb5-d4a3-588b-90e2-ae4c6bd845eb.html |
Nine members of the 1952 Frederick High football team gathered Wednesday. Back row, from left: Harold Staley, Bob Whitmore, Bob Butler, Ray Wright and Wayne Fender. Front row, from left: Dick Shank, Ed Geisler, Ray Crum and Earl King.
Staff photo by Alexander Dacy
Football reunion: Unbeaten 1952 Cadets’ spirit carries on — along with spirits
Every year, there’s a new keeper of the Crown Royal bottle first bought 10 years ago by members of Frederick High’s 1952 football team.
It’s unopened, contained in a small, velvety royal purple and gold bag that the owner does not touch until they hand it over at the end of their year-long stewardship.
Who will finally take the first sip?
“Whoever’s the last man standing,” Dick Shank said, eliciting laughter from those within earshot.
There’s only 12 players from that 1952 team that still remain, all between the ages of 86 and 88. Nine were on hand at the Golden Corral on Wednesday for what has become an annual reunion that started in 2012, along with that Crown Royal tradition, for the group’s 60th anniversary.
It’s now been 70 years since that squad became the first high school football team in Maryland to go 10-0 in one season.
“It’s so much fun to see these guys every year,” Bob Butler said. “The amazing thing is, we’ve all changed physically, but everyone has the same spirit and mentality as when we were 18.”
And they remember the Cadets’ escapades well.
Ed Geisler recalled he once wrote a letter to sportscaster Jim Gibbons, who featured a local high school team each week on his show, in an attempt to get the Cadets on the program.
“We were the best team in the area, so why not get on TV?” he said.
Gibbons received the message, and three weeks later, the team’s captains and school’s glee club made its way to Washington, D.C., to appear on the show.
There was also the season finale against Baltimore’s Southern High School, a dominant 39-0 win on a chilly November night. Though an unremarkable final result, the contest and shot at history only happened because the team had to shovel snow off the field beforehand.
The football from that game, which clinched the then-record-setting season, now sits in a display case at the school, along with a varsity jacket and other memorabilia from that squad.
At Wednesday’s lunch, the alum reviewed a scrapbook that Butler’s mother made in 1952, with newspaper clippings, game programs and a few photos highlighting the team’s dominant run.
And with the current Frederick High team matching the 1952 squad with a 7-0 start, conversation naturally turned to the Cadets’ rise to the top.
They were delighted to hear the team shut out Linganore last Friday, so often a boogeyman for Frederick. Ray Crum, who helps organize the reunion, is one of the only members of the 1952 squad to see this year’s team.
“With their size, I don’t think any of us would be able to make the team now,” he said.
“Believe it or not, we’re more spry,” Butler cracked.
The 1952 squad is planning to send signed letters of congratulations and encouragement to the 2022 squad, with Butler hoping to deliver them before the start of the playoffs.
But before they finalized that plan, they had to bequeath the bottle of Crown Royal to its new owner. Ray Wright’s name was drawn out of a hat, and he’ll hold on to the prized possession until the team meets again next October.
And the bottle figures to go unopened for several more years.
Bob Butler | 2022-10-20T04:14:32Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Football reunion: Unbeaten 1952 Cadets’ spirit carries on — along with spirits | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/football-reunion-unbeaten-1952-cadets-spirit-carries-on-along-with-spirits/article_f5538b18-3733-5370-bb16-c2a1d646914e.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/football-reunion-unbeaten-1952-cadets-spirit-carries-on-along-with-spirits/article_f5538b18-3733-5370-bb16-c2a1d646914e.html |
With but one exception, Thursday of 1971, yesterday was the largest day in the history of the local fair association. Nearly 35,000 people packed the grounds, and this was the second largest crowd ever collected in the 62 years of the local fair. Thursday of 1917 was the largest day in the history of the fair. About 40,000 people were present on that day.
Claude Saney, 15 years old, who ran away from Hagerstown to follow the fair, was located by local police force yesterday evening and sent back to his home. He left home and followed the fair to this city. He accepted a position at one of the stands out at the fair. The attention of authorities was called to the extreme youth of the boy and it seemed to the police that he was entirely too young to be working at the fair.
Two men were arrested at the fair yesterday by Sheriff James A. Jones and Deputy Sheriffs Charles W. Smith and Harry C. Dorcus, charged with having liquor in their possession. One of the men had entered a race horse in the fair and had rented a stall. A five-gallon can half filled with corn liquor and four or five bottles of whisky were found in the stall.
Much has been written about the animal, which has “terrorized” the peaceful inhabitants of Araby and Baker’s Valley. It has been termed a panther by some while other folks were of the opinion that a wild cat was causing the commotion. The “panther” was declared today to be a big shepherd dog belonging to a man named Myers who lives in the Valley. This information was advanced by residents of Baker’s Valley. The dog is said to have been seen prowling about in the woods on the farm of Emory Fink, and this has led to the belief that the “panther” scare was all a hoax.
A political first for Thurmont could result from the town’s election Monday, Oct. 25. Ms. Eileen R. Waesche is seeking one of two open commissioners seats on the town’s four-member board. The town has never had a woman on the board of commissioners, although a female ran previously.
Frederick County Commissioners Tuesday night recommended nine county farms for state farmland preservation easement purchases. During a public hearing at Winchester Hall, 15 farms were reviewed by the commissioners. In the priority ranking system, the farms are graded on soil type; transfer or tenure position; development pressure including land use, zoning, subdivisions, comprehensive plan, roads, water and sewer and the planning staff recommendation; management practices including soil conservation practices and the advisory board’s evaluation, and tract size.
Pumpkin stories from the Kids’ Page: “The Laughing Pumpkin,” by Robin Hoffman, third grade, South Frederick: Once upon a time a pumpkin was sitting in a window. A boy came by and saw the pumpkin, and he was scared. So he ran off and the pumpkin was laughing. Then a ghost jumped out and the pumpkin fell off the window. A girl stepped on it and got the pumpkin on her shoe. And the pumpkin wasn’t laughing any more.
Claude Saney
Runaway With The Fair
Bootleggers At The Fair
Corn Liquor
Baker's Valley Panther
Big Shepherd Dog
Eileen R. Waesche
Thurmont Town Commissioner Candidate
Winchester Hall
Farmland Preservation Easement Purchases
Pumpkin Stories
Robin Hoffman | 2022-10-20T05:53:17Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 20-40-100 Years Ago — Oct. 20 | News | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-20/article_6acd24ed-f17e-55c1-b74a-ddcdb7af0034.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-20/article_6acd24ed-f17e-55c1-b74a-ddcdb7af0034.html |
FREDERICK NEEDS YOUR INPUT
The Downtown Frederick Partnership will host a workshop on Oct. 26 to talk about a plan to include a new sculpture to coincide with the redesigned Seventh Street Fountain Park space in downtown Frederick. Construction on the fountain will begin in the summer of 2023. DFP wants your feedback on the public art piece. Here is a chance for us to come together as a community to envision the future aesthetic of this downtown space for generations to come. Find details at downtownfrederick.org/projects.
LAST WEEK FOR RENNFEST
If you’re thinking about going to this year’s Maryland Renaissance Festival, this is your last chance! The festival in Crownsville runs through Oct. 23, and then the royal court, jugglers and strolling troubadours pack it in for the season. If you find yourself wishing RennFest lasted all year, here’s your chance to take a piece of it into your daily life by signing up for local fencing classes. This week, Jacob McDonald, Frederick instructor and founder of Round Table Historical Fencing, provides us with some intel about what fencing is, what it isn’t, and what you need to know if you’re interested in learning it for yourself.
‘THE SPOON’
Here’s looking at you, Hood College staff, faculty, students and alumni! Baltimore artist Jim Condron is exhibiting his paintings and found-object sculptures in the solo show “The Spoon” this week at the school, with a nod to the school’s wandering pink spoon trophy. Condron’s exquisite work often straddles the line between the personal and the historical and layers in ideas about weather, holidays, seasons, food, disappointment, absurdity, youth and childhood. Stop in through Oct. 21 to see the work before the show comes down. The gallery is open daily from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.
NEW ARTISTIC DIRECTOR AT OTHER VOICES
Other Voices Theatre was at the helm of Susan Thornton for many years. When she retired earlier this year, the community theater company knew she was leaving behind some big shoes to fill. Coming up as the theater’s new artistic director is Steve Cairns, who has been involved with the theater for about five years as an actor and director. In fact, in addition to his new role as artistic director, he is currently directing “The Addams Family,” a musical comedy that runs through Oct. 23. Stop by for a Halloween treat and see his work in action.
CATCH SOME LIVE MUSIC
Frederick has got some great options to hear live music this week. Catch the Irish quartet We Banjo 3 on Oct. 21 at the Weinberg Center; hear Mark Bryan, of Hootie & The Blowfish, on Oct. 22 in support of his most recent solo release, “Midlife Priceless,” also at the Weinberg Center; or, for a more intimate set, check out singer-songwriter Carey Anne Farrell at Beans in the Belfry on Oct. 21, when she performs a record release concert for her debut album, “Someone Else’s Wings.”
CELEBRATE SPOOKY SEASON
Carroll Arts Center is hosting a weeklong film program of seasonal classics — “It,” “Scooby-Doo,” “Dracula,” “Friday the 13th” and ending with “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” — complete with pre-packaged audience interaction kits. If Netflix and Chill is more your speed, check out our lists in this week’s issue of classic Halloween films, as well as films to be released this year. | 2022-10-20T05:53:23Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | NEED TO KNOW: Week of Oct. 20 | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/need-to-know-week-of-oct-20/article_f2cb5ed6-3b7f-5f5e-8504-e054bbfe48f1.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/need-to-know-week-of-oct-20/article_f2cb5ed6-3b7f-5f5e-8504-e054bbfe48f1.html |
The vital five pillars of caregiving
By Lindsey McCormick, ESPC Board Member
Meaningful Interaction with persons who are living with dementia requires an understanding of how they experience the world and how to communicate in ways that make sense to them. The Vital 5 Pillars discusses five elements that lead to successful interactions.
“V” is a reminder to validate the other person’s emotional experience. Feelings are a physical fact. When we try and talk someone out what they are feeling, it is as ridiculous as trying to tell someone in a full leg cast to just take it off, that it is all in their head. Whatever we are experiencing is reality, and we need to have space to allow other people to feel what they are feeling.
“I” allow us to Improvise and be in the moment. People living with dementia often experience life as if on stage in perpetual improve act. Their short term memory and retention of some long term memories combine to make their worldview one of improvisation, they don’t know what is coming next. A lot of how they are responding has to do with how the stage is set and how the act is going onstage. If someone only remembers things that are said for a few seconds, they are responding right then and there, in the moment.
“T” reminds us to Terminate the Task Trap. The task trap is what happens when we are too busy being routine focused, avoiding interpersonal responsibility, and putting tasks ahead of people. If you go straight to the task, you are going to fail the majority of the time. Step one in any meaningful interaction is to build a personal connection with the other person. To build trust, to establish a relationship that will allow them to give you the opportunity to assist with that task. Never go straight to the task. Always take time to connect with the person.
“A” helps us Accommodate a person’s sensory deficits, especially visual and language processing problems. People with Alzheimer’s disease often lose peripheral vision, depth perception, they don’t see things that are similar in color when they are right next to each other and they may not process movement fluidly. When it comes to language, their vocabulary shrinks. When it comes to late stages, they may only be able to say a handful of words and can generally only understand 50-70% of the words we say to them. This means they start to rely a lot more on non verbal communication than the words we are trying to say. You have to learn to say a lot less with your words and a lot more with your behavior.
“L” lets us know that Life history is the most important tool we have to work with. Life history give us two key things. It allows us to see how the person interprets the context they are in, and allows us to understand their identity, that is how they see themselves. If we interact with someone in a way that doesn’t match how they see themselves, it is not going to go as smoothly as we would like.
The next time you are working with an individual who appears to be struggling, go down this list of these five key elements, and ask how they apply to that individual. This can assist in providing much more meaningful and useful interactions with those you are caring for. | 2022-10-20T13:07:40Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | The vital five pillars of caregiving | Lifestyle | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/the-vital-five-pillars-of-caregiving/article_ccd3f7ac-2ca7-501d-af54-4e8901e29480.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/the-vital-five-pillars-of-caregiving/article_ccd3f7ac-2ca7-501d-af54-4e8901e29480.html |
The entrance to Frederick Classical Charter School on Spires Way off Monocacy Boulevard.
Frederick Classical Charter School holds 'emergency' meeting
The Board of Trustees for Frederick Classical Charter School (FCCS) held an "emergency public meeting" last week.
The Frederick News-Post did not attend the meeting, which was held virtually at 7 p.m. on Oct 14. Board members declined to be interviewed afterwards via an email from an attorney representing them.
A statement provided by Christopher Barrett — an attorney with the law firm Barton Gilman — said that the board "discussed and/or voted on" five things at the meeting. They included "matters related to grants and fundraising for the School in response to communications from the Frederick County Public School District with respect to the Charter School’s Student Activity Fund."
The board also discussed the school's history curriculum in response to communications from FCPS, the statement said.
It said the meeting minutes would be available once they were approved at the board's next meeting in November.
FCPS Director of School Management and Charter Schools Daniel Lippy wrote in an emailed statement that discussions "were related to ensuring that fundraising practices and curriculum resources were aligned with FCPS policies and regulations."
"FCPS policies and regulations change over time," Lippy wrote. "Similar to the Board of Education, charter schools go through the same process of evaluating whether or not current practices are in alignment with the policy and/or regulation. If there is a discrepancy, the charter board will enact changes necessary to bring school practices in alignment."
Frederick Classical Charter School's Board of Trustees also discussed hiring someone to act as a liaison between it and the school, the statement said. It also discussed the school's extracurricular activities and the replacement of its photocopying equipment.
After the public portion of the meeting, board members entered closed session to discuss "confidential matters" and "matters protected by the attorney-client privilege," the statement said. | 2022-10-21T00:38:08Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Frederick Classical Charter School holds 'emergency' meeting | Schools | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/schools/frederick-classical-charter-school-holds-emergency-meeting/article_6081048a-2a23-550e-b4a8-fcdbe6e74eca.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/schools/frederick-classical-charter-school-holds-emergency-meeting/article_6081048a-2a23-550e-b4a8-fcdbe6e74eca.html |
County Executive Jan Gardner, D, delivers her eighth and final State of the County address on Oct. 6.
Staff file photo by Jack Hogan
Crisis stabilization center expected to open at Montevue Lane facility next summer, Gardner says
The Frederick County Health Department's crisis stabilization center will be built over the next year at 340 Montevue Lane in Frederick, which currently houses the county's Board of Elections, County Executive Jan Gardner said Thursday.
The Board of Elections will relocate to Riverside Corporate Park, off Monocacy Boulevard, in early 2023, Gardner said. The Board of Elections will not move from the building until January or February, she said.
Gardner said in August that the center would be constructed at the county's campus on Montevue Lane, but she refrained from saying which building would house the center.
The center will provide care to people experiencing a behavioral health emergency, including substance use disorders and mental health illnesses. Its staff will connect patients to additional care options in the community, Gardner said during a press briefing.
The center will be an alternative to the emergency department for people experiencing a behavioral health emergency. The county hopes the center will lower health care costs for patients and reduce the burden on first responders and the emergency department at Frederick Health Hospital.
Behavioral health emergencies account for roughly one in five emergency department visits at Frederick Health Hospital, Gardner said.
The county will pay for the center using two federal grants that total more than $1.5 million, a $1 million state grant and $850,000 from the county's American Rescue Plan Act allocation.
The annual operating cost for the center will be around $1.2 million, Dr. Andrea Walker, director for the county's Behavioral Health Services Division, wrote in an email to the News-Post. The state government is working to make some crisis stabilization services reimbursable through Medicaid, which will assist with ongoing costs, Walker wrote.
The county will pay ongoing costs for the center, in part, with payments that opioid manufacturers will make in legal settlements. Frederick County is expected to receive $11.2 million over the next 18 years, Gardner said.
The Mental Health Association of Frederick County, which will operate the center, plans to move its walk-in clinic to the Montevue Lane location and offer services 24/7.
People can make referrals to the center through the Mental Health Association's crisis hotlines, 211 and 988. First responders, law enforcement, mobile crisis response teams, community providers and family members of those in crisis may also provide referrals to the center when it opens. | 2022-10-21T00:38:14Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Crisis stabilization center expected to open at Montevue Lane facility next summer, Gardner says | Hospitals And Doctors | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/hospitals_and_doctors/crisis-stabilization-center-expected-to-open-at-montevue-lane-facility-next-summer-gardner-says/article_fb1fe169-18ef-5a42-83ea-7998122ec035.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/hospitals_and_doctors/crisis-stabilization-center-expected-to-open-at-montevue-lane-facility-next-summer-gardner-says/article_fb1fe169-18ef-5a42-83ea-7998122ec035.html |
City approves agreement for statue of legendary outdoorsman
A monument at Frederick's Culler Lake to one of Frederick County's best-known sportsmen is one step closer to happening, after a vote Thursday night by the city's aldermen.
The aldermen voted unanimously to approve an agreement with the group Friends of Lefty Kreh to install and accept a sculpture to honor the Frederick native.
The bronze sculpture will be placed in the water at the northeast corner of Culler Lake, with an accompanying wayside exhibit to tell the story of Kreh's career.
Occasional fly-casting clinics will be held for children and adults to help advance Kreh's legacy as a master fly caster.
Bernard Kreh, whose 2018 obituary in The New York Times described him as “one of the pre-eminent sport fishermen of his time,” graduated from Frederick High School in 1942.
After serving in the Army during World War II, he returned to Frederick to work at what later became Fort Detrick.
He was an outdoors columnist for The Frederick News-Post and the outdoors editor for The Baltimore Sun.
He was inducted into both the Freshwater Fishing and the International Game Fish Association halls of fame, and Fly Fisherman magazine hailed him as “fly fishing’s greatest ambassador.”
Alderman Kelly Russell said learning about Kreh's legacy has been eye-opening, and she looks forward to the completion of the project. | 2022-10-21T00:38:20Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | City approves agreement for statue of legendary outdoorsman | Travel And Outdoors | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/travel_and_outdoors/city-approves-agreement-for-statue-of-legendary-outdoorsman/article_716222c7-5d83-573f-a01d-72a838d7f53c.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/travel_and_outdoors/city-approves-agreement-for-statue-of-legendary-outdoorsman/article_716222c7-5d83-573f-a01d-72a838d7f53c.html |
City approves grant for airport tower
The control tower at Frederick Municipal Airport will receive a federal grant for new equipment after city officials approved it.
The mayor and aldermen voted at their meeting Thursday night to approve a $115,000 grant from the Federal Aviation Administration to update important equipment in the airport's control tower. The equipment is coming to the end of its operational life.
The grant and an ordinance to amend the fiscal 2023 budget to account for the money were approved as part of the meeting's consent agenda, which contains various items considered noncontroversial. Those items are usually approved collectively in one vote, often without discussion of individual items.
The money comes from a grant program set up as part of the federal infrastructure bill passed by November that provides $20 million to update, repair and replace airport towers and install new equipment.
The Frederick grant will include money for new radios and a backup weather station, among other items.
In August, the city's Municipal Airport Commission sent a letter to the mayor and aldermen saying that it had reviewed the grant offer and voted 4-0, with one abstention, to recommend that the city accept the offer. | 2022-10-21T00:38:26Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | City approves grant for airport tower | Aldermen Council | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/levels_of_government/municipal/aldermen_council/city-approves-grant-for-airport-tower/article_37d3bf50-710a-5c82-a069-ad4de1d9517a.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/levels_of_government/municipal/aldermen_council/city-approves-grant-for-airport-tower/article_37d3bf50-710a-5c82-a069-ad4de1d9517a.html |
Suzi Borg of the Mental Health Association of Frederick County talks about the Ride United network during a United Way breakfast Thursday at Evangelical Reformed United Church of Christ.
Ken Oldham, the CEO and president of United Way of Frederick County, talks about the Ride United network during a United Way breakfast Thursday at Evangelical Reformed United Church of Christ.
United Way partnership to expand ride options for people in need
United Way of Frederick County is forming a partnership to expand ride options for underserved individuals and families.
Ride United Network (RUN) is anticipated to start in March 2023, Ken Oldham, CEO and president of United Way of Frederick County, said Thursday during a leadership breakfast.
“We're hopeful that this will be another very significant toolbox in our transportation community in Frederick County,” he said. “And I'm hopeful and anticipating that we'll be able to hit some of those major gaps that we saw in our program.”
RUN is a product of the United Ride pilot program that ran from November 2021 to June of this year.
The program provided more than 4,200 rides to asset limited, income constrained, employed (ALICE) individuals and collected 12 to 18 data points per ride. The data looked at gender, age, ethnicity, the purpose of the ride, where people were going and more.
With the data, United Way identified transportation service gaps that RUN aims to fill using ride providers. The gaps were found among youths, older people, veterans and those in rural areas, Oldham said.
Ride providers will have to apply to be a part of RUN and receive funding through the program to help with the gaps. Oldham said United Way hopes to have all of the ride providers selected by February 2023.
Some organizations that could apply as ride providers are entities such as City Youth Matrix, which provides transportation to youths, or Partners in Care, which provides rides for older people, Oldham said.
RUN already received $250,000 in funding from the American Rescue Plan Act that should pay for 8,000 to 10,000 rides over two years, Oldham said. More funding is anticipated from other sources, he said.
Once RUN starts, it doesn’t mean data collection will stop. Oldham said data collection is crucial to gauge the need for transportation and how to fill it.
The data could also be used by community leaders, he said. For example, it could show where to add a bus route.
Several organizations that provide rides to groups that need transportation, like older people, youths, those with mental health problems, and low-income households, spoke on Thursday about their struggles to provide the needed resource to everyone.
Suzi Borg, the crisis services division director at the Mental Health Association of Frederick County, said the organization can’t always get transportation for people who call.
“It's great for the number of people we've helped, but there are people that we haven't been able to help and those situations where maybe somebody doesn't quite meet the criteria,” she said. “How do we help them?”
That's where RUN steps in.
Frederick County Executive Jan Gardner, the breakfast’s keynote speaker, emphasized how important transportation is, especially for ALICE individuals and households.
“We need transportation to get to work, to go to school, to run our errands, to go to medical appointments, all of the essentials of day-to-day life. So public transportation plays an important and key role in connecting individuals and families to resources and opportunities,” she said. | 2022-10-21T00:38:32Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | United Way partnership to expand ride options for people in need | Transportation | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/transportation/united-way-partnership-to-expand-ride-options-for-people-in-need/article_b01ab335-f81e-52eb-9c13-ad486077e298.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/transportation/united-way-partnership-to-expand-ride-options-for-people-in-need/article_b01ab335-f81e-52eb-9c13-ad486077e298.html |
Frederick County Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer
The Frederick News-Post · In The Booth with M.C. Keegan-Ayer, candidate for County Council
Frederick County Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer said she would use a third term on the council to meet more frequently with residents in her district and improve access to county government services, including health care, on the west side of Frederick.
Keegan-Ayer, the Democratic nominee for the council's District 3 seat, said she wants to ensure the county gets information about local government contracts out to local business owners in her district and that community members understand how to navigate the procurement process.
"There were some issues ... in my district that were uncovered during COVID and I felt like I was probably most prepared to be the one to address those issues," Keegan-Ayer said of her decision to run for re-election, during a podcast interview with the News-Post.
During Keegan-Ayer's tenure on the council, the county opened a walk-in COVID testing clinic along the Golden Mile that has since been transformed into a satellite office for the Health Department. Keegan-Ayer said she would advocate for the county to add more health care services to the area.
Keegan-Ayer has represented District 3, which covers the western part of Frederick, since 2014. She has been both president and vice president of the County Council.
Her Republican opponent is Shelley Aloi, the executive director of the Marriage Resource Center of Frederick County and a former member of the Frederick Board of Aldermen.
In her podcast interview, Keegan-Ayer discussed her takeaways from the July primary election that she lost by one vote. She won the Democratic nomination after a judge ruled that her opponent, Jazmin Di Cola, did not meet the residency requirement to run for the district's seat.
Keegan-Ayer said the primary election revealed to her that people in the district felt their voices weren't being heard in the county government. She said she assumed that community members and organizations would reach out to her if they had concerns about the county government.
Keegan-Ayer said she would use a third council term to hold regular meetings with community members and organizations in her district.
"I have made it a point in the months since that election to try and reach out to different communities in the district to hear from them," she said. "Perhaps some of the concerns that they have might not be able to be addressed at the county level. They might be concerns that are [Frederick] city concerns or state or federal concerns."
To learn about county, state and federal candidates in the general election, go to the News-Post's voters guide at tinyurl.com/generalelectionguide. | 2022-10-21T02:21:23Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Keegan-Ayer campaigning to improve access to government services in her district | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/keegan-ayer-campaigning-to-improve-access-to-government-services-in-her-district/article_0363eb99-4736-5bd9-9561-b7baceb92f00.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/keegan-ayer-campaigning-to-improve-access-to-government-services-in-her-district/article_0363eb99-4736-5bd9-9561-b7baceb92f00.html |
This weekend will mark the first time an American public school system is hosting the conference, which brings together researchers and educators from across the globe, Lee said.
"Some of the premier thinkers in education from around the world are coming to Frederick," Lee said. "We're just delighted to be able to host for our local neighbors and also to host for people from far away."
ResearchED's goal is to connect the people who study the science of learning with the people in charge of teaching, Lee said. She hopes the conference will prove equally useful to both groups.
"[The researchers] are coming to talk about what their research is showing about how children learn," she said. "But they need to talk to practitioners in the classroom to find out what's happening on the ground level and how that research can be useful in the classroom."
Frederick County Public Schools has stepped into a space traditionally dominated by smaller, privately funded schools, Lee said. The district was recently highlighted in a national case study for its implementation of Mind, Brain and Education Science (MBE), an approach that looks to combine neuroscience, psychology and teaching.
Lee said FCPS' work in recent years has made the district a leader in MBE, and shown that research-informed teaching works just as well in public schools as it does in private ones. That, in turn, has allowed it to attract what is expected to be a bigger crowd at this weekend's conference than what is typical for ResearchED's U.S. events, Lee said.
"The science of learning is about the most universal thing in education," Lee said. "I don't know why it has lagged in public education."
The conference will run all day Saturday at Frederick High School.
Businesses in downtown Frederick — including the National Museum of Civil War Medicine and Surelocked In Escape Games — are offering specials Saturday evening to encourage conference attendees to explore the city.
"It's really become a whole community effort," she said.
Meg Lee | 2022-10-21T02:21:36Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Frederick to host hundreds for worldwide education conference | Education | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/frederick-to-host-hundreds-for-worldwide-education-conference/article_c63884f3-0fac-5a3e-a2b4-5181ded32e0b.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/frederick-to-host-hundreds-for-worldwide-education-conference/article_c63884f3-0fac-5a3e-a2b4-5181ded32e0b.html |
From left, Army Spc. Ashley Bryan, April Babka, Xiankun (Kevin) Zeng and Jun Liu make up the Molecular Pathology team for the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick.
Dr. Xiankun (Kevin) Zeng talks about tissue samples of monkey testes that show monkeypox. A study that Zeng and his molecular pathology team conducted provides evidence for the potential sexual transmission of the virus.
Fort Detrick researchers publish findings that indicate potential sexual transmission of monkeypox
Fort Detrick researchers, who previously published important studies on the behavior of Ebola, Marburg and other viruses, recently became the first scientists to detect monkeypox virus in tissue samples from monkey testes.
The research team, based at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in Frederick, also found preliminary evidence that the virus can continue to be detected in monkey testes even after it has cleared from most other organs and healed skin lesions.
Their findings, published on Monday in the prominent science journal Nature Microbiology, indicates that monkeypox could be spread from person to person through sex — potentially even after the person seems to have recovered.
According to a news release about the study from USAMRIID, it’s already been understood that monkeypox can be transmitted through close contact during sexual activity.
What hasn’t been clear, however, is whether the virus can be replicated in the testes or transmitted through semen, according to the release.
The scientists’ recent findings show that the monkeypox virus could be shed into the semen of monkeys at the peak of their infection, as well as when the infection is gradually declining, said Xiankun (Kevin) Zeng, the study’s senior author.
That means men may be able to spread monkeypox to others through their semen, Zeng said.
But while monkeypox could be a virus with the potential for sexual transmission, Zeng stressed that it is not a sexually transmitted infection.
Unlike for STIs like gonorrhea, genital herpes and syphilis — which are mainly transmitted through sex — monkeypox can also be spread through forms of close contact that aren’t sexual.
“As a scientist, we want to bring the message to the people very clearly, and at the same time, we don’t want to bring the stigma to a certain group of people,” Zeng said. “That’s very important.”
Monkeypox, a disease that can cause pimple- or blister-like rashes and fever, among other symptoms, began spreading in the U.S. in the middle of May. The number of daily new cases nationwide peaked during the summer, but has been dropping during the last two months.
As of Thursday, there have been 27,835 confirmed cases of the virus in the U.S. Seven hundred of these cases have been reported in Maryland, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Maryland Department of Health does not report an exact case count for jurisdictions with fewer than 10 monkeypox cases. Frederick County is among these jurisdictions, according to the department’s monkeypox dashboard.
Zeng and his colleagues began their research in late May, using archived tissue samples taken from the testes of crab-eating macaques about a decade ago.
Their samples included tissue taken from 21 monkeys who had died from the virus and 20 monkeys who survived.
In the monkeys who died, the scientists detected monkeypox virus in the interstitial cells and seminiferous tubules of the testes — sites of sperm production — and in the epididymal lumina, a site of sperm storage and maturation.
Of the samples taken from the 20 monkeys who survived the virus, two showed that the virus remained present in the creatures’ testes at the time they were euthanized, weeks after their initial infection.
One monkey was euthanized 21 days after being infected, and one was euthanized 37 days after being infected.
Because researchers used archived tissues, however, they weren’t able to isolate the virus from the samples they studied. That’s a step, Zeng said, that scientists would need to take to say with more certainty whether the virus present in testes is infectious, especially after an animal’s skin lesions heal.
“If we wanted to show people, ‘This is infectious,’” he said, “you have to isolate.”
Additionally, the monkeys that Zeng and his colleagues analyzed in their study demonstrated a more lethal and severe disease caused by the virus than has been observed in humans. The monkeys also were infected with a different type of monkeypox than what has been circulating in the current outbreak.
In the future, Zeng said, the research team hopes to work with another USAMRIID lab also studying monkeypox.
In doing so, Zeng and his colleagues hope to conduct further research to determine whether the virus detected in semen is infectious, and how long it takes for the virus to clear completely from the testes.
Testis | 2022-10-21T02:21:42Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Fort Detrick researchers publish findings that indicate potential sexual transmission of monkeypox | Treatment And Diseases | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/treatment_and_diseases/fort-detrick-researchers-publish-findings-that-indicate-potential-sexual-transmission-of-monkeypox/article_c46bd7c1-d5e3-5a3f-ab98-a72d58596606.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/treatment_and_diseases/fort-detrick-researchers-publish-findings-that-indicate-potential-sexual-transmission-of-monkeypox/article_c46bd7c1-d5e3-5a3f-ab98-a72d58596606.html |
Gallant Gulla aids Titans’ tight win over Lancers
Michael Gulla’s value to the Tuscarora boys soccer team isn’t always apparent because the Titans don’t play a lot of close games.
They have beaten everyone they’ve played this season by at least two goals, aside from the one game they lost to Liberty (4-3) on Sept. 29.
But, in a game like Thursday’s, with a trip to Saturday’s Central Maryland Conference championship game riding on the line, playing without the county’s leading scorer against the team that plays and thrives in a lot of one-goal games, Gulla’s value to the Titans was very apparent.
“Our man of the match was Michael Gulla,” Tuscarora coach Todd Knepper said of his senior midfielder following a 1-0 home win over Linganore. “We don’t really call him this, but he’s the guy that blows stuff up. And he did enough of that tonight.
“I think he won every aerial battle. No fouls. [He makes] the type of plays that you worry about on this surface. He plays 80 minutes a game for us most nights, doesn’t score a lot of goals, doesn’t get a ton of credit. He just slips under the radar for the work rate and the efficiency that he has. And he jumped in a ton of passing lanes tonight, and he won a ton of goal kicks.”
The win, which was dominated by Tuscarora (13-1) but did present a few moments of tension, sends the Titans into Saturday’s CMC championship game at 2:30 p.m. against Brunswick (11-1-1) at Thomas Johnson High School.
The victory over Linganore also marked the first time this season the Titans had failed to score at least two goals in a game. But that could partially be explained by the absence of senior striker Erick Rodriguez, who received a red card in Tuesday night’s 3-0 win over Oakdale and was forced to sit out Thursday’s game.
With 21 goals and 18 assists (60 points) this season, Rodriguez is the leading scorer in Frederick County by a wide margin. The next closest player has 35 points.
“It hurt not having Erick,” Gulla said. “But we have other players who can get the job done.”
Tuscarora generated sustained pressure on the Linganore goal throughout the game and was able to cash in midway through the first half when senior midfielder Ryan Stouffer scored off a feed from senior striker Nicholas Stevenson.
“We did some really good things tonight, and I am proud of the group,” Knepper said. “All of the seniors got on and contributed in different ways. Some of the younger guy stepped it up. It wasn’t the most beautiful or exciting game, but we got the result, which is really what we were after.”
The Titans needed a win or a tie to advance to the CMC championship game. Otherwise, it was going to be Linganore.
The Lancers have won a slew of 1-0 games this season. This was one of the rare ones that didn’t go their way.
“We have been blessed so far to come out on top in a lot of these situations,” said Linganore assistant coach Zach Yurich, who was filling in for head coach Kirk Meehan since he was away at a family function. “But a 1-0 game against this type of team is not a bad result.”
Michael Gulla
Todd Knepper | 2022-10-21T03:59:17Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Gallant Gulla aids Titans’ tight win over Lancers | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/gallant-gulla-aids-titans-tight-win-over-lancers/article_fc6757a5-9284-5248-8301-fa6923b3eec5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/gallant-gulla-aids-titans-tight-win-over-lancers/article_fc6757a5-9284-5248-8301-fa6923b3eec5.html |
n Frederick (7-0) at Oakdale (6-1): Frederick’s defense has very subtly become one of the dominant story lines of the season, as it has emerged from the shadow of the Cadets’ dynamic offense. Frederick has not allowed a point so far in the month of October, a span of 10 quarters, and has only surrendered 26 all season. The Cadets have only allowed more than six points in a game only once this season. They will surely be tested against an Oakdale team that has averaged better than 31 points through seven games. Last week, the Bears hung on for a 28-26 home win over previously unbeaten Urbana. Oakdale had a lengthy winning streak against Frederick until last season when the Cadets earned a 35-21 home win over the Bears. This game figures to be much more low scoring with a pair of respectable defenses on the field. The winner will be one of the major favorites to claim the Class 3A West regional title in the playoffs.
n Linganore (3-4) at Thomas Johnson (1-6): Ben Pearch sealed the Patriots’ first win of the season last week with a last-minute interception in a 17-14 win over Tuscarora. It avenged an overtime loss to the the Titans the previous season. This week, TJ hopes to build upon its momentum against Linganore. The Patriots have not beaten the Lancers since 2012. Meanwhile, Linganore is looking to shake off last week’s 17-0 road loss to Frederick and round back into form heading into the Class 3A West playoffs.
n Middletown (4-3) at Catoctin (2-5): Middletown found its passing game for the first time this season last week, as senior quarterback Cam Baker threw for 272 yards and three touchdowns, more than doubling his passing yardage for the season in a 35-10 homecoming win over Brunswick. If the Knights can sustain this passing dynamic going forward, it will make them a very difficult team to beat in the playoffs, as defenses will still have to contend with senior running back Carson Smith, who once again surpassed 200 yards in the win over Brunswick. On the other hand, Catoctin is looking to snap a three-game losing streak. They were shut out 37-0 last week at Walkersville. They have not beaten Middletown since their state championship season in 2009.
n Walkersville (3-4) at Brunswick (5-2): The Railroaders saw their five-game winning streak end with last week’s 35-10 loss at Middletown, a team they have not beaten since 2003. This week, Brunswick will look for its first win over Walkersville since 2010 on its way to state semifinals that season. These teams renewed their rivalry last season for the first time since 2016, and Walkersville earned a 28-13 home win last October. The Lions are looking to claw back to .500 and earn back-to-back wins for just the second time this season. A win over Brunswick would mark their fourth victory in five games, as they look to build momentum heading into the Class 2A West playoffs.
n MSD (7-1) at California School for the Deaf (3-4): Ethan Guettler of MSD is the second-leading rusher in Frederick County this season with 1,023 yards and 13 touchdowns on just 66 attempts. He and fellow senior Zion Ortiz are a big reason why the Orioles are averaging better than 45 points per game. This week, they make the trip across the country in search of their seventh consecutive victory. Meanwhile, California School for the Deaf has been slumping over the last month, as the Eagles have lost three in a row heading into this game.
n St. John’s Catholic Prep (4-3) at Severn School (5-2): The Vikings fell to 0-2 in the MIAA C Conference standings last week with a 13-7 road loss to previously winless Annapolis Area Christian. This week, they will have a chance to get one of those wins back in a game that will impact the final MIAA C standings. This is a rematch of a conference game that was played on Sept. 30 and won by Severn, 41-6. The Admirals are 2-0 in MIAA C play, but they are coming off a 20-18 loss at Green Street Academy in Baltimore last week. | 2022-10-21T03:59:23Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Week 8 High School Football Capsules | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/week-8-high-school-football-capsules/article_da3e9cf5-eecf-5905-bdd3-3d261e99ba07.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/week-8-high-school-football-capsules/article_da3e9cf5-eecf-5905-bdd3-3d261e99ba07.html |
Quarterback Taylor Heinicke throws a first-down pass to receiver Terry McLaurin during Washington’s road win over the Giants last season.
“The continuity is important,” coach Ron Rivera said. “And for a guy like Terry ... the rapport he has and he develops with guys is tremendous because of his athletic ability and his skill set. ... We’ve got to make sure he’s involved at the very beginning of what we’re trying to do because he’s such a dynamic guy.”
“Today we had a route out there, and one of the guys could have done something a little different, and Taylor right away explained it to him,” Rivera said. “ ... He’s got a very good knowledge of it. And you saw it during the regular season when he was the backup going up to players and explaining certain things to them. He’s very solid in this.”
The transition will require some adjustment to the play calls so that they are better suited to Heinicke’s skill set.
Heinicke and the young pass-catchers, including wideout Jahan Dotson and tight end Cole Turner, must adjust to one another, too. And in the running game, the addition of Brian Robinson Jr. and the new starters on the interior offensive line will offer Heinicke a different look from last season. But a change of any sort often can jump-start a team in the doldrums.
“I know we’ve had some quarterback changes over the years, but having a guy that you have worked with, that the receiver group has worked with, that makes for a smooth transition,” he said. “I think his ability just to extend plays is really big for us. The heart ... he plays with, I feel like a lot of our guys galvanize behind that, and I know he’s going to give us a good chance to be successful this weekend.” | 2022-10-21T03:59:35Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | No stranger to QB changes, Terry McLaurin is taking this one in stride | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/no-stranger-to-qb-changes-terry-mclaurin-is-taking-this-one-in-stride/article_7279b7fc-03b3-5c5f-a494-99749dc05515.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/no-stranger-to-qb-changes-terry-mclaurin-is-taking-this-one-in-stride/article_7279b7fc-03b3-5c5f-a494-99749dc05515.html |
The annual fair ball of the Cotillion Club was held last night at the Armory with about 70 out-of-town guests present. About 60 members of the club attended the social function, which marks the close of the fair and the beginning of the social season in Frederick. Dancing was enjoyed from 9 to 1 o’clock. Refreshments were served by the Frederick Hotel during intermission from 11:30 to 12:30 o’clock. Music was furnished by the Frederick Orchestra.
Serious losses running as high as 25 percent of the crop in some localities have been attributed to the Hessian fly during the past year, says E.N. Cory, State entomologist, who cautions farmers against a repetition of the infestation unless the safe dates for planting wheat are observed.
Virginia Fay Strailman, the 7-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Victor Strailman, Brunswick, had a narrow escape from serious injury yesterday evening as she was struck by a machine while crossing the corner of West Fourth and North Market streets, this city. With her parents, she had just stepped from the loop car at the Fourth street corner when the little girl started to cross Fourth street without waiting for her parents. She stepped directly in front of a machine that was traveling east on Fourth street at an extremely low rate of speed. The child was hit and knocked down, but the driver stopped his car at once, and no part of the girl’s body was run over.
The state’s annual survey of Frederick County nursing homes revealed overall conditions and quality of life for residents are good this year. Very few violations were listed for Homewood Retirement Center, Vindobona Nursing Home and the Home for the Aged. Eleven violations were cited for Meridian Nursing Center-Frederick, formerly Frederick Nursing and convalescent Center, most of which were related to paperwork. “No matter how good or how hard the nursing home tries to be perfect,” said Patricia Throne, director of the local Office of Aging and nursing home ombudsman for the county, “state surveyors will always find something wrong.”Cancer researchers have discovered a new compound from a soil sample taken near Baughman’s Lane and preliminary studies show it to be a promising drug in the fight against the dreaded disease. But even more astounding than its anti-tumor properties is its unique L-shaed structure, which leads the National Cancer Institute-Frederick Cancer Research Facility (NCI-FCRF) scientists to believe they have discovered a whole new family of drugs. And those scientists have decided to name it after the city where it was discovered, calling it Fredericamycin A.
A West Virginia woman has been arrested in the fatal shooting of a young mother and her infant daughter in Walkersville on Saturday, police said. Sonja Marie Daniels, 25, of Martinsburg, will appear in Berkeley County Circuit Court today to decide whether or not to voluntarily return to Maryland, where she faces two counts of first-degree murder. Deanna Prichard, 16, and her 5-week-old baby, Mykayla, were gunned down in the street near their home on Discovery Boulevard just before 3 p.m. Saturday. Ms. Daniels, who once lived in the same neighborhood where the shootings occurred, was described as the former girlfriend of the father of Ms. Prichard’s baby.
ASHLAND, Va. — Authorities believe the Washington-area sniper left a message with a telephone number at the scene of the latest shooting in Virginia, The Associated Press learned Sunday. Police appealed to the person who left the message to contact them. Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose said the sniper task force investigators were working on the assumption that the sniper has expanded his geographic reach after shooting 11 people, nine fatally, in the Washington area since Oct. 2. Public schools in the Ashland and Richmond area will be closed Monday “based on the volume of parent and community concern,” school officials announced late Sunday.
Social Season In Frederick
Frederick Hotel
Hessian Fly And Wheat Crop Destruction
Virginia Strailman
Hit By Car
Frederick County Nursing Home State Survey
Patricia Throne
New Compound
Soil Sample Baughman's Lane
National Cancer Institute-frederick Cancer Research Facility
Sonja Marie Daniels
Deanna Prichard
Discovery Boulevard
E.n. Cory | 2022-10-21T05:37:15Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 20-40-100 Years Ago — Oct. 21 | News | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-21/article_13966828-b3cd-5bd6-8f81-a49630a91d71.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-21/article_13966828-b3cd-5bd6-8f81-a49630a91d71.html |
Sue Hecht Frederick
I received a vile mailer from Michael Hough, the Republican candidate for county executive, targeting his opponent, County Councilwoman Jessica Fitzwater, a Democrat.
The vicious piece charges that Fitzwater knew about inexcusable abuse of disabled Frederick public school children but did nothing. This is untrue.
The Frederick County Public Schools system is managed by an elected independent board of education. Our County Council and county executive have no authority over the management of the school system, the board of education or the superintendent.
To charge that Fitzwater, a mother of two, a public school teacher and a public servant, would have known more than Hough, a state senator, is a cheap political stunt.
Hough is too extreme for Frederick County, whose citizens deserve an executive who will bring people together.
As many of us are receiving our mail-in ballots, let me warn voters. Hough is trying to rebrand himself as moderate. He is actually an extreme conservative.
In 2021, the American Conservative Union determined that he had the second highest lifetime conservative rating among current Maryland state senators.
He was honored by the Conservative Political Action Conference, the ultraconservative political action group. He said he was honored to be recognized for his "conservative principles."
Hough was U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz’s Frederick County presidential campaign chairman in 2016 and chaired Donald Trump’s campaign in Frederick County in 2020. He is too extreme for Frederick.
I have years of personal experience with Hough and his brand of campaigning that he is now using against Fitzwater.
For years, he worked with Alex Mooney, his boss, using the same campaign tactics. Hough is the chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Mooney.
The Frederick County executive does not have control to restrict development and to slow growth, which seems to be the mainstay of Hough’s campaign. Zoning decisions — in fact, all land-use decisions — are up to the County Council. Zoning is a legislative, not executive, function.
Frederick County families deserve Fitzwater. She is a proven and honest public servant who brings people together.
Hough has raised more than twice as much money as Fitzwater — much of it out-of-state and PAC money. That is why we see ceaseless negative cable TV ads and glossy multipage attack mailers from him.
Please pay attention to this critical election contest between the far-right extremist Hough and Fitzwater, a true public servant.
Hecht represented Frederick County for three terms in the Maryland House of Delegates. | 2022-10-21T07:12:56Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | As an extreme conservative, Hough should not be county executive | Letters to the Editor | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/as-an-extreme-conservative-hough-should-not-be-county-executive/article_1606dd0c-af43-5dd8-8fb6-ae160c160930.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/as-an-extreme-conservative-hough-should-not-be-county-executive/article_1606dd0c-af43-5dd8-8fb6-ae160c160930.html |
Jesus Christ is the answer
By John Magee | Words of Faith Special to the News-Post
Just days after graduating from high school, I moved to Los Angeles to attend college. While there, I took a job at a sportfishing landing located in the LA Harbor. It didn’t pay much, but as my schedule allowed, I could fish on the boats for free. That was a huge benefit to me. It was a big operation and there were boats heading out day and night.
One time I went on an overnight trip to fish San Clemente Island, which is located about 40 miles off the coast. We enjoyed a beautiful day of successful fishing. As we started our journey back, the wind picked up, making the ocean very rough. Even though we were on a boat that was 88 feet long, the boat was violently tossed back and forth. It was a long and slow ride back to the harbor. Most of us were scared and very sick during the return trip.
That experience happened almost 40 years ago, but it’s still vivid in my mind. I recall the experience each time I read about Peter in Matthew chapter 14.
After Jesus heard of the death of John the Baptist, he departed on a ship to a desert place. When the people learned where he was, a large congregation gathered there. The Savior had compassion on the people and performed miracles of healing for all who were sick. When it became too late for the people to return to their villages to obtain food, the Savior performed another miracle. From only five loaves of bread and two fishes, Jesus blessed the food which then fed 5,000 people with 12 full baskets of fish and bread to spare.
Jesus then sent his disciples in a boat to travel to the other side of the Sea of Galilee. During the night, a big storm with high winds tossed the boat around, and the disciples were scared. They saw someone walking toward them on the water. It was Jesus who said, “Be of good cheer, it is I; be not afraid.”
Seeing the Lord, Peter said, “Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water.” The Savior beckoned for Peter to come. At first, Peter got out of the boat and was successful walking on the water. Then, seeing the wind and the water around him, Peter began to sink. Peter cried out for the Lord to save him, which he did immediately.
There are some lessons I learned from this account.
1. Focus on the Savior, Jesus Christ. Peter exercised faith by stepping out of the boat. When Peter set his sights on the Savior, he could walk on water. Peter did not start to sink until he noticed the wind and the water. Faith always precedes the miracle. Don’t doubt; only believe.
2. Obedience is the first law of heaven. In Isaiah we read, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.” Even when things don’t make sense, obedience is the key. Be obedient and do not fear.
3. For whatever your affliction, Jesus Christ is the solution. Through his infinite and atoning sacrifice in the Garden of Gethsemane, the Lord paid the price for all sin, injustices and imperfections. As we repent, we are afforded spiritual cleansing, which allows us to return to God’s presence. The time to prepare to meet God is now. “I beseech you that ye do not procrastinate the day of your repentance” (Alma 34:33).
4. The Lord has his own timetable. He did not go to the disciples until the fourth watch. I’m sure it was unnerving to be on the water in such rough conditions throughout the night. The Lord knows us personally and knows what we need. The answers and solutions to our afflictions may not come as quickly as we would like.
We live in a world with many challenges and opportunities. We all suffer through “storms.” I encourage you to turn to the Savior, Jesus Christ. If you stay focused on him, strive to be obedient, repent and trust in him, I know he will help you through difficult experiences.
John Magee is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He is currently serving as a Counselor in the Frederick Stake Presidency. He is married to the love of his life, Stephanie. They have four children, who are all grown up. John’s occupatio n is selling software to the government, and he still enjoys fishing when he gets a chance. | 2022-10-21T16:09:04Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Jesus Christ is the answer | Religion | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/religion/jesus-christ-is-the-answer/article_6971e5d4-5f4d-5b40-8010-8edd29c36de5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/religion/jesus-christ-is-the-answer/article_6971e5d4-5f4d-5b40-8010-8edd29c36de5.html |
One injured after dump truck rolls over on Interstate 270
A man was injured after a dump truck rolled over on I-270 north near Urbana on Friday morning, authorities said.
At around 11:15 a.m., the Frederick County Division of Fire and Rescue Services received a call that a dump truck rolled over on I-270 north near Baker Valley Road. A man was stuck inside.
Fire and Rescue responded and got the man out of the truck. He was then put on a helicopter to be flown to the hospital, Wivell said. The truck also had a fuel spill, he said.
As of 1:35 p.m., one lane was open for northbound traffic, Wivell said. The dump truck still needed to be removed and the fuel spill cleaned up, he said.
I-270 south was closed briefly for a helicopter to land, he said. | 2022-10-21T19:12:28Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | One injured after dump truck rolls over on Interstate 270 | Public Safety | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/public_safety/one-injured-after-dump-truck-rolls-over-on-interstate-270/article_8c2f1961-6783-5a5c-9bc1-67dbc6236c01.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/public_safety/one-injured-after-dump-truck-rolls-over-on-interstate-270/article_8c2f1961-6783-5a5c-9bc1-67dbc6236c01.html |
Nancy A. Allen
Olivia Angolia
Ysela Bravo
Six of the seven Frederick County Board of Education candidates in this year's general election appeared at a forum this month at New Spire Arts Stages. From left: Nancy Allen, Olivia Angolia, Cindy Rose, Rae Gallagher, Dean Rose and Karen Yoho.
School board candidates share views on safety, history lessons, library books
The Local News Network at the University of Maryland's Philip Merrill College of Journalism and Capital News Service sent questionnaires to all 155 school board candidates in Maryland. It received responses from 110 candidates, including all seven running in the general election in Frederick County.
Employment: Yes, I work for a professional membership association
Education: Bachelor of Social Work, McDaniel College (Western Maryland College)
I saw a need for a more fair and balanced representation on the board that would directly reflect and represent Frederick County. The decisions made by the BOE have been in direct opposition to what the majority of parents and the community wanted for their children. The disregard for the rights of parents, lack of accountability from the BOE for the disastrous situation of FCPS special education population that resulted in a DOJ investigation, and the lack of transparency in the implementation of policies and curriculum based on ideologies, theories and practices not founded on qualifiable or quantifiable research. I want to rebuild the trust that has been lost by the current BOE.
I have a varied and strong skill set that includes management and leadership in the areas of human resources, daily business operations, events, grants, contracts and compliance with local, state and federal laws and regulations. I will serve the parents, children and teachers of Frederick County Public Schools as a conservative critical thinker with a passion and persistence for the truth. Children are our future. Let’s focus on building and creating leaders for tomorrow.
Admiring public leaders is not something I do. I either like or dislike, agree or disagree with current leadership and their decisions. I have not been invested in admiration of public leaders for many years, so the last public leader that left a significant impression on me was Ronald Reagan.
I feel that academics are the most important issue facing our school system. The focus on serving the student with a traditional learning experience has fallen to the wayside. Ideologies and theories that are being taught and practiced in the classroom that take time away from the core subject matter. The goal would be to bring each student up to the greatest achievement level based on their abilities and provide a challenging environment for students in order to stimulate the desire to learn while creating critical thinkers and leaders for the future.
School and classroom safety are critically important for students and teachers. I fully support all Student Resource Officer (SRO) programs in place and would work to strengthen those programs through advocacy and funding at the county level.
We need to give all students the ability to discern for themselves the good, the bad and the ugly of past events. Allow students to understand that with history, decisions were made based on what was known and practiced at a particular time or period and how those events influenced where we are today. We don’t need to segregate history based on race. We can teach history as a subject that allows the students to discern and apply critical thinking skills to determine the outcomes of past actions and how you can take what was learned in the past, apply it to today and how history helps us to make better decisions for today and future generations.
Any book that contains pornographic pictures and content. Many books under question and discussion that have parents upset and addressing their school boards are books that violate the federal laws on child pornography.
Employment: I manage a local small business, and I’ve also been a health practitioner for 10 years.
Education: I completed half of my associate's degree from Frederick Community College, then opted for trade school instead.
I am running on the Education Not Indoctrination slate with Nancy Allen and Cindy Rose to ensure that all children receive the best quality education possible, focused on the core academic subjects and with no political or ideological bias. Our goals also focus on parental rights, not keeping secrets from parents and ensuring that they have power over their children’s medical decisions and education. I would also like to expand vocational education opportunities and implement mandatory financial literacy classes.
I am passionate about ensuring that every child gets an excellent education, that we are creating productive members of society whether they go into the workforce, higher education, etc. As a graduate of the FCPS system and lifelong Frederick resident, I can bring a unique perspective to the board, one similar to the positions of our county’s younger families and their concerns. Being a business manager at a successful Frederick County business, I have experience in administration and management, in addition to being a practitioner in health sciences.
I admire Rand Paul, because he stands for truth and justice. He is not swayed by political parties or agendas. He believes in small government, personal responsibility, fiscal conservatism, parental rights and school choice.
School boards have been abdicating their responsibilities and duties to do what’s best for a child’s education. There is too much focus on sexuality, racial division and political activism. I want to remove all of that from the classroom. These are family topics of discussion, not government school discussions. Government has no place teaching its preferred ideologies. Transparency and accountability to parents and taxpayers are equally as important, especially considering our recent DOJ investigation that revealed overuse and abuse of seclusion and restraint. FCPS should be recording all committee meetings and making them easily available to the public to restore public trust through transparency.
Expanding the SRO program is an option that should be reviewed to strengthen student and staff safety. I would also want to review and strengthen current safety policies and make sure every school is complying. Those practices and protocols should be universal throughout FCPS.
We don’t teach history without infusing emotion and racial bias. That’s very concerning. Children graduate without knowing that we are a country founded on Judeo-Christian principles. We teach them to believe America was founded on slavery and white supremacy. That should bother every parent and taxpayer funding those lies.
Any book with pornographic material should not be on school library shelves. There needs to be a vigorous process to review library books that are already adopted, and any prospective books.
Employment: HR Manager, Asian American Center of Frederick
Education: B.A., Ryokan College
I am running for school board because I believe that all children should have the broad educational choices and experiences that were afforded to my children. As a former PTA president and substitute teacher, I know firsthand that a nurturing learning environment comes about only through steadfast dedication and hard work. I look forward to meeting this challenge, to serving the community, and to expanding opportunities for success for every child in the county.
My experience as a human resources manager has taught me the value of successful recruiting and retention plans. I also quickly learned the importance of establishing a sound understanding with employees through clear communication. I have successfully advocated for my employees under tight budgets. I have served as treasurer and president of NMES PTA and was a substitute teacher, including in special education classes. As the human resources and community relations manager at a local nonprofit that serves this community, I’ve gained invaluable insight into the experiences of families in need and the difficulties they face with school communications.
I live in Frederick County and have been impressed by our county executive, Jan Gardner. She has had to lead a purple and divided county through growth and change while instituting a new charter government. Our county has a triple A bond rating and has experienced economic growth even through a pandemic. She has brought back funds to our county that help those who need it and has shown her dedication to our schools through funding.
Retention is the most important issue in this race. From our bus drivers and custodians to our teachers and administrators, recruiting and retaining an energetic, talented staff has to be a top priority because these individuals create the environment in which our children learn and thrive. Schools are just buildings until educators and staff invest in them to make them come alive. We, in turn, should be just as creative and committed to finding innovative ways to ensure that our great educators and staff want to stay in our schools and can afford to live in our community.
School safety is always a concern. Mental health issues, bullying, harassment and violence are issues that need to be addressed. Our schools have to be a welcoming environment where every child can be seen for who they are and receive help when they need it. We need trained counselors in our schools that our students can trust and build relationships with.
I would prefer more examples of diversity in our books and history lessons to exemplify the true history of our country.
No. I have faith in the library professionals that stock our school libraries.
Education: Center for Supportive Schools, Senior Program Director (MD/DC/DE region)
Education: Master in Public Administration, University of Baltimore
I am personally invested in the success of Frederick County Public Schools. I am committed to enhancing our public education system through transparency and communication, full funding, and collaboration with key community stakeholders. I am not a single-issue candidate, and well aware that being a board member requires consistent pulse checks on the direction and progress of our entire school system; a collaborative and thoughtful approach; and a willingness for the tough conversations that move FCPS forward. I am focused on student achievement, increased funding, recruitment/retention of quality educators, and equitable policies for all students.
I’ve been a Frederick County resident for about 17 years and I have two children enrolled in the public school system. I have a perspective on the challenges and opportunities within our system. Most of my career has focused on providing support, educational advocacy, and youth development for students and their families. I have the privilege of working alongside educators and staff on social-emotional learning initiatives to build leadership capacity and peer-to-peer mentoring for middle and high school students. I previously served on the Board of Education during the COVID-19 pandemic, giving me a perspective and level of experience that is unique.
I strongly admire the leadership of Frederick County Executive Jan Gardner as a local leader who cares deeply about our community, our schools, and our county’s future. Gardner has consistently worked with colleagues across the county to build relationships, form coalitions, and listen to a variety of stakeholder perspectives.
One of my most pressing concerns is the recruitment and retention of highly qualified teachers and staff. The FCPS pay scale is not competitive to surrounding jurisdictions, but compensation is just one aspect of attracting and retaining high-quality educators. The expectation that school system employees will simply continue to do whatever it takes to get the job done is increasingly untenable. I will take long-term action in the budget planning process to ensure that all FCPS employees access a comprehensive and competitive salary and benefit structure. I will work closely with other board members, teachers and staff to address workload, though solutions will not be easy.
Safety of school buildings is extremely important. The most effective strategies to reduce school shootings include incorporating programming that address student mental health, training teachers and educators on recognizing signs that a student may be considering harming oneself or others, ensuring that school buildings are secure, and partnering with policymakers at the state level on common-sense gun laws. I will advocate for increased mental health services and connections to community programs that address the mental health needs of all students.
I do not have concerns with the way history is being taught within FCPS and I fully support a multicultural curriculum that embraces and celebrates diverse experiences, perspectives, and promotes inclusive values. All of our students will benefit from experiencing textbooks, materials, historical examples, and curriculum that intentionally includes people of color, LGBTQ+ people, feminists, indigenous people, and others from diverse backgrounds. As a BOE member, I will ask questions of curriculum specialists and examine existing materials while pushing for fair, accurate, and equal representation of various experiences (people of color, LGBTQ+, and other underrepresented groups).
I am not in favor of banning books within FCPS. The primary purpose of our public education system is to expose students to a variety of resources, perspectives, and experiences to help them develop critical thinking skills and teach them how to think for themselves. I do believe that it is important to have a clear process in place for reviewing curricular materials (which FCPS has) that allows parents and community members to review new books and materials — and provide comments on these materials. Ultimately, the BOE needs to listen to input from parents, community members, and students — but also trust the expertise of the professional educators.
Employment: Retired paralegal/office manager
Education: Why isn’t this question about “life experience?” Lots of Ph.D.’s have ruined public education.
To help remove the union control and political activism in our classrooms. To restore parent/teacher control over what our children are learning and when they learn it. To store the ability to think critically about facts and circumstances instead of reacting from emotions. Schools are currently creating children who can’t cope with the world because they are being taught to be guided by their emotions.
I’ve been advocating for parent and student rights in education for over a decade. I’ve sued FCPS and have a proven record of fighting for what’s right for parents and their children. I don’t believe any of us co-parent with government and I don’t believe in identity-driven education.
This question isn’t relevant, so I respectfully pass.
School boards have been abdicating their responsibilities and duties to do what is best for a child’s education. There is too much focus on emotions, sexuality, racial division and political activism. I want to remove all of that from the classroom. These are family topics of discussion, not government school discussions. Government has no place teaching its preferred ideologies. As a matter of fact, I’d say it’s illegal.
I’m extremely concerned. Restorative justice has removed the ability to properly discipline students. Restoring consequences for bad behavior is a priority.
We don’t teach history without infusing emotions and racial bias. That’s very concerning. Children graduate not knowing we are a country founded on Judeo-Christian principles. We teach them to believe America was founded on slavery and white supremacy. That should bother every parent and taxpayer funding those lies.
Yes. I believe certain books have no place in a school library. We recently got “Gender Queer” removed from one of our school libraries. It’s not just vulgar. It meets the federal definition of “pornography.”
Employment: I am an insurance and financial services agent with State Farm Insurance Companies.
Education: I received a Bachelor of Science degree from Marshall University.
I’ve always had a passion for young people and education. I am where I am today because of the mentorship of teachers and coaches. I’ve advocated, mentored, coached and volunteered on behalf of young people for most of my life. Frederick County is a wonderful place to live and raise a family. I want to ensure that we have a school system that meets the needs of all of our students and is a source of pride in our community.
I have 37 years of business experience and have served on both corporate and nonprofit boards. Most recently, I served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Boys & Girls Club of Frederick County, where I served as board chair for two years. I also served as a boys varsity basketball coach in FCPS for 13 years. In preparation to serve on the BOE, I have watched or attended every board meeting since 2018, met with teachers and staff, and visited over two dozen schools.
It’s difficult to name one public leader, but if forced to name one, I admire Barack Obama for his ability to communicate and his commitment to all Americans. I believe he was the ideal president at the time of his election and provided our country with the type of service we should all aspire to. He serves as an example to all young children that their dreams are possible.
Our school system is facing a number of difficult issues, but I believe the most important task ahead of us is implementation of the Blueprint for Maryland due to the impact it can have on our schools, students, staff and families. Full-day pre-K for all students, a career ladder for teachers and staff, expansion of our career and technology education, and ensuring that all of our students are career and/or college ready will all have a significant impact on our students, families, staff, and our community. As a board member, I will hold our superintendent accountable for its implementation.
FCPS has already taken significant steps to improve school safety. We have some of the best trained SROs in the entire country and we need to continue to emphasize their roles within our schools as educators and relationship builders. Every FCPS school now has a locked entry vestibule that allows the office staff to safely clear all visitors. I believe we need to continue to address bullying both online and in person through expansion of our Character Counts, Social Emotional Learning Programs, Restorative Practices, staff training, and consistent application of our discipline policies.
I do not currently have any concerns regarding the way history is taught in FCPS schools. I will always work to ensure that our complete history is always provided to our students. Our greatness lies in the fact that we are able to learn from our past mistakes and move forward as a society. Providing our students access to our complete history, warts and all, is an important part of their education.
I think there could always be a situation where a particular book may need to be removed from our school libraries, but I’m more concerned with ensuring that our review and approval process is thorough, and we work closely with our media specialists to make sure all of our texts are age-appropriate and offer our students a broad range of educational and life perspectives. Instead of considering what “kind” of books should not be in school libraries, I think we should examine each individual book on its own merits.
Employment: Frederick County Board of Education; office manager for Yoho Electrical Services
Education: Master’s degree in Educational Leadership from Hood College
Education has always been a priority of mine. I have spent the last almost 50 years of my life focused on the welfare of students. I care about public education as a great equalizer and opportunity builder for all. As a former classroom teacher of 25 years and a substitute teacher for 12 years prior to that time, I feel my experience of working in schools with staff and students provides a needed voice on the school board.
It takes time to learn what it means to be a Board of Education member. I have spent the past four years on the board during some of the most difficult years that anyone in a leadership position has had to navigate. While not all agree with the specific decisions that were made, I believe most will agree that our board listened and tried to find a middle ground that focused on our students. I care deeply about the school system, its students, and the employees, and I would like to continue to be a steward of our resources and taxpayers’ dollars as we work together to build on our successes and ameliorate our weaknesses as we create an even better FCPS.
Our current county executive, Jan Gardner. Gardner is a good steward of taxpayers' dollars while providing needed services to the citizens. All three rating houses have given us a AAA rating under Gardner’s watch. Frederick is the fastest growing county in Maryland showing that people desire to move here. Gardner has provided some of the highest levels of education funding to help us continue to try to dig out after the damages from the 2008 recession and bare maintenance of effort funding, in which school staff positions had to be cut. I am concerned with other services such as roads, libraries, senior citizen services, etc., and Gardner has also provided for these, but education has always been my focus.
It varies. However, I believe the one that encompasses many concerns is class size. Parents are rightly concerned. Will students get the attention they need and deserve? The staff is burdened with workload issues and basic class coverage when classes are large. For instance, if an elementary test takes 10 minutes each to grade, each group of six tests takes one hour to grade. And that is just one part of that teacher’s day. Planning for each class/group, meeting with students, grading, making parent contacts, and on and on, expands with larger classes the time it takes to do the job well and provide the best instructional program for the students. Time and money are finite resources.
While schools are still overall one of the safest places to be, all it takes is one tragic incident to make us all feel vulnerable.
I have no concerns about the content that is taught, I just wish there was more time for teaching social studies, particularly in elementary classrooms. We need students to learn authentic and actual history, not how we would like it to have been. It also needs to be taught in an age-appropriate manner, so that students can build their understanding. Many citizens believe that we could enhance our teaching of civics to enable our students to be more involved and engaged citizens in the future.
Our media specialists have an approved system for ordering books. Recently, a high school media specialist ordered a book based on reviews. When the book arrived, the media specialist felt that the book was not age-appropriate, so it was never placed on a shelf for circulation. I have trust in our media department to make good selections based on the students in their individual buildings, the basic tenets of school librarians, and the central office director of media services.
To learn about county, state and federal candidates in the general election, including Frederick County Board of Education candidates, go to the News-Post's voters guide at tinyurl.com/generalelectionguide. | 2022-10-22T00:26:40Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | School board candidates share views on safety, history lessons, library books | Board Of Education | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/board_of_education/school-board-candidates-share-views-on-safety-history-lessons-library-books/article_f4dd5fa6-b11e-5583-9259-c395e86ff1fd.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/board_of_education/school-board-candidates-share-views-on-safety-history-lessons-library-books/article_f4dd5fa6-b11e-5583-9259-c395e86ff1fd.html |
Steve Whisler and Jenni Pompi stand on opposite sides of the cultural divide roiling school board races in Maryland and nationwide. Whisler objects to what he called the “1619 Project curriculum” that focuses on the role of racism in America’s founding. Pompi praises schools that teach students about “the disenfranchisement and marginalization of Black, brown and indigenous people.”
They are among some 102 Maryland school board candidates who responded to a Capital News Service survey on education issues.
Sixteen named learning loss stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic as the key issue facing schools in their district. Another 16 cited other academic performance issues as most important.
Only 11 cited social issues, such as critical race theory and books about sexuality in school libraries, as the most important issues facing their schools.
The candidates’ concerns about learning loss span the state, as well as the political spectrum. Candidates in 10 Maryland counties, from Allegany in Western Maryland to Wicomico on the Eastern Shore, named learning loss as the top issue in the CNS survey.
The debates about the teaching of the nation’s racial history, along with parental concerns about books about sexual identity, have energized school board races in Maryland, as well as nationwide.
The CNS survey responses, along with a review of the websites of candidates who did not respond to the survey, show that social conservatives are now running for board seats in at least 13 of Maryland’s 23 counties.
Learning loss and overall student performance emerged as the top issues in the survey, even though it’s difficult to know exactly how far behind students fell. Because of the pandemic, the State Department of Education did not release its county-by-county school report cards — its most comprehensive look at how students are learning — in 2020 or 2021. | 2022-10-22T00:26:46Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | School board candidates cite learning loss, student performance as biggest issues | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/school-board-candidates-cite-learning-loss-student-performance-as-biggest-issues/article_ae00945d-a909-5db2-8954-e82ec9f2d3f9.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/school-board-candidates-cite-learning-loss-student-performance-as-biggest-issues/article_ae00945d-a909-5db2-8954-e82ec9f2d3f9.html |
Jessica Ellis, the manager of harm reduction and diversions programs at the Frederick County Health Department, explains how to use Narcan nasal spray during a training session.
Health Department: Everyone should be trained in overdose prevention
Everywhere Jessica Ellis goes, she keeps a tiny nasal spray canister in a pocket of her purse.
Packaged in plastic and foil, the device weighs no more than 2 ounces. But, if administered correctly, Narcan — the intranasal form of naloxone, a drug used to treat opioid overdoses — can save a life.
“The reality is, everyone should carry Narcan,” said Ellis, manager of harm reduction and diversions programs at the Frederick County Health Department. “It doesn’t matter if you think that you would have the opportunity to use it or not. You never know where you’re going to be, where you might need to use it.”
Medical experts far and wide, including the United States surgeon general, agree.
For the past eight years, employees at the local health department have been working to teach as many Frederick County residents as possible how to respond to and prevent overdoses.
Last year, the department trained 959 people in responding to overdoses, according to data provided by Ellis.
Now, she said, the department appears to be reaching more people. From the start of 2022 through the end of August, the department had trained 1,664 people.
The overdose response training team offers virtual training sessions every Friday at 1 p.m. and on the second Wednesday of every month at 6 p.m., Ellis said.
Employees also offer training sessions during staff meetings and lunch breaks at workplaces and attend community events, where they distribute Narcan and teach people how to use it.
Earlier this month, Ellis trained a Frederick News-Post reporter how to administer Narcan and respond to an overdose.
The session, which lasted about 35 minutes, covered the state of the opioid epidemic in Frederick County, the science of overdoses, how to tell whether somebody is overdosing and what to do to help them.
Symptoms of an overdose include someone not breathing and their lips or fingertips turning blue or purple. Another symptom the health department has tried to emphasize, Ellis said, is loud snoring and gurgling noises.
“Unfortunately, there have been cases where someone has been mistaken and sleeping, and then they do fatally overdose as a result,” she said. “We’ll tell people, especially if you know that person has a history of drug use, if you hear that loud snoring and that gurgling sound, check on them.”
“Because,” she continued, “the worst thing that can happen is you wake them up, and they can go back to sleep. They can’t wake up from a fatal overdose.”
Trainers always advise people to administer Narcan, even if they don’t know whether somebody is having an overdose, Ellis said. If it’s not an overdose, naloxone won’t harm the person. Side effects are minimal and rare from the medicine, and it is safe for children and pregnant women.
Under Good Samaritan laws, people who administer naloxone to someone they believe is experiencing an overdose don’t have to worry about getting in trouble. You can’t be held liable for a good-faith attempt to save someone’s life, Ellis said.
And if there is drug paraphernalia around, Ellis said, nobody — including the person who overdosed, the person who administered aid and others nearby — should be arrested, charged or prosecuted.
The reception to harm-reduction programs — which accept that people will engage in high-risk behaviors, and attempt to reduce the negative consequences associated with those behaviors — has become more normalized, Ellis said.
“I don’t know if it’s just more of a discussion. I don’t know if the opioid crisis and loss of lives has helped people realize that we need to try things differently and take a different approach,” Ellis said. “I’m not really sure, but views and thoughts have changed in a very positive direction.”
Cheryl Ford-English, a peer recovery specialist for the Mental Health Association of Frederick County, was doubtful when she first heard about safe houses — medically supervised facilities where people can inject drugs.
“I just thought it was the craziest thing in the world to do,” she said with a laugh.
But as she learned more about the philosophy behind harm reduction strategies, she said, she became more supportive of them.
Now, she offers overdose response training, often alongside Ellis.
“We just don’t want anybody to perish,” she said. “At least they can do [drugs], but still live. Still live. Still be alive, still be here to go on to the next day.”
“And,” she added, “just hoping that one day, something happens or something sparks them to not want to use.”
Jessica Ellis | 2022-10-22T00:26:58Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Health Department: Everyone should be trained in overdose prevention | Treatment And Diseases | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/treatment_and_diseases/health-department-everyone-should-be-trained-in-overdose-prevention/article_19b72333-bec4-5eb7-9c04-197333781c7a.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/treatment_and_diseases/health-department-everyone-should-be-trained-in-overdose-prevention/article_19b72333-bec4-5eb7-9c04-197333781c7a.html |
A man suffered "traumatic injuries" after a dump truck rolled over on I-270 north near Urbana on Friday morning, authorities said.
At around 11:15 a.m., the Frederick County Division of Fire and Rescue Services received a call that a dump truck rolled over on I-270 north on the bridge above Baker Valley Road, Fire and Rescue Battalion Chief Jeremy Wade said.
It had rolled onto the center median guard rail, he said. A man was stuck inside the truck.
Fire and Rescue responded and got the man out of the truck, Wivell said.
Wade said the extrication was "difficult and lengthy." He didn't know exactly how long it took.
The man was then put on a helicopter to be flown to the hospital, Wivell said. The truck also had a fuel spill, he said.
As of 3 p.m., the truck has been removed from the highway and the fuel spill has been cleaned up, Wade said.
The northbound lanes, with the exception of the right lane, were closed while an emergency guardrail was installed, Wade said.
I-270 south was closed briefly for a helicopter to land. | 2022-10-22T00:27:05Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Updated: One injured after dump truck rolls over on Interstate 270 | Public Safety | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/public_safety/updated-one-injured-after-dump-truck-rolls-over-on-interstate-270/article_8c2f1961-6783-5a5c-9bc1-67dbc6236c01.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/politics_and_government/public_safety/updated-one-injured-after-dump-truck-rolls-over-on-interstate-270/article_8c2f1961-6783-5a5c-9bc1-67dbc6236c01.html |
Carleah Summers
“Most candidates hate to door knock. I love it,” she said.
As someone who interacts with different types of people every day, helping people in recovery from addiction, she said, engaging with people comes naturally.
She estimates that she knocks on 75 to 100 doors a day in an attempt to reach voters.
Summers is the Democratic nominee for a state Senate seat from District 4. She will face Republican William Folden in the Nov. 8 general election.
Summers, the founder and executive director of Andrea’s House, which provides transitional housing for women and children, said she doesn’t see the race as a matter of winning and losing.
“It’s about representing the recovery community, which really hasn’t had much of a voice,” she said.
The COVID-19 pandemic revealed how limited resources are for addicts and those dealing with mental health problems, she said.
With 16 years of sobriety herself, she said limits on access to health care, treatment, and mental health services led to a lot of overdoses and suicides among teenagers and adults.
“We’re coming out of a very dark period,” she said.
She would like to use a Senate seat to help Frederick County address issues such as opioid addiction, affordable housing, and child care.
Getting access to child care puts extra stress on parents, for people in recovery and for others, she said.
The county needs more housing, but the issue is also deciding where housing goes, she said.
While those decisions would be made by the County Council or officials in municipalities, she said, a senator can make their opinion known and work with governments and nonprofit groups.
“I personally don’t think that any level of government can address that issue alone,” she said.
She would specifically like to work on the issue of affordable housing.
No one should have to drive to another county for work to be able to afford a home in Frederick County, she said.
District 4 includes much of the county outside the city of Frederick, stretching from Summers’ home in Brunswick through communities such as Middletown, Myersville and Jefferson and around to New Market and Urbana on the eastern side of the county.
As she makes her way around the district, people are concerned about issues such as education, transportation, and the economy, she said.
They talk to her about their concerns about safety for students and teachers in school, as well as pay for teachers.
On the economy, people want to know that things will get back to some sort of normalcy, she said.
Summers said she supports plans to widen Interstate 270 with toll lanes, but has concerns about how to make sure that workers can get help with the tolls to avoid further financial hardship.
Her experience with the recovery community has shown her the need for more public transportation around the county.
With the current state of public transportation, people are left spending money on ride-for-hire services to get to treatment or take their kids to child care, she said.
Voters also want officials to get back to working together to get things accomplished, she said.
She points to her experience working with different types of people every day to help the recovery community as a way to help reach that goal.
People don’t have to agree with others to respect their point of view and find common ground, she said.
To learn about county, state and federal candidates in the general election, go to the News-Post’s voters guide at tinyurl.com/generalelec tionguide.
Name: Carleah Summers
Hometown: Brunswick
Occupation: Founder/executive director: Andrea’s House, Transitional Living for Women and Children
Previous campaigns/offices: none
Campaign website: carleahsummers.com
Facebook: Summers for Senate
Instagram: Summers for Senate
Maryland Senate | 2022-10-22T02:49:37Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Summers seeks Senate seat to address housing, recovery | Employment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/employment/summers-seeks-senate-seat-to-address-housing-recovery/article_7131aa71-a5ff-5800-9d61-da6830603944.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/employment/summers-seeks-senate-seat-to-address-housing-recovery/article_7131aa71-a5ff-5800-9d61-da6830603944.html |
Albany quarterback Reese Poffenbarger (7), shown against Baylor earlier this season, has been piling up accolades as his Great Danes have struggled to win games.
The Final Score podcast: Middletown grad Reese Poffenbarger is winning awards as Albany's freshman starting quarterback
After collecting a string of individual honors in his first season as the starting quarterback at the University of Albany, Middletown High graduate Reese Poffenbarger is this week’s guest on The Final Score podcast.
Poffenbarger was named this week as the Stats Perform FedEx Ground National Freshman Player of the Week. That follows four consecutive weeks of being named the Rookie of the Week in the Colonial Athletic Association.
He chats with host Greg Swatek about squaring these individual honors with the Albany’s struggles this season, as the Great Danes are 1-5 overall after a series of very close, high-scoring games.
He also talks about the process of becoming the starting quarterback at Albany after transferring over the summer from Old Dominion University, facing a nationally prominent program like Baylor in his first game as a starter and what his daily routine is like as a Division I college football player.
Prior to that, FNP sports writer Alexander Dacy joins Greg to discuss fall sports in Frederick County, as they near the end of the regular season. They look back on Week 7 of the high school football season and look ahead to Week 8.
The podcast is available at http://www.fnppodcasts.com and via iTunes, Google Play and other podcast apps.
What follows is a transcript of the conversation between Poffenbarger and Swatek. It has been edited for space and clarity.
Swatek: I know you appreciate all the individual accolades. The team’s record is obviously not where you want it to be at 1-5. You guys are scoring a ton of points in these games, you’re just losing a lot of high-scoring, very close games. You had a tough one on homecoming this past week against Hampton in overtime. How do you square your individual success that you’re having with the team’s performance so far?
Poffenbarger: Obviously, the individual awards are really cool. But it’s not as cool as winning. Winning obviously takes precedence over everything. And we’re trying to put together wins, obviously struggling a little bit on the defensive side of the ball right now. But it’s a team effort. And there’s stuff we can be doing on offense to help them out. And [we’re] really just focusing on the team and trying to put some wins together.
Swatek: How do you guys get over the hump?
Poffenbarger: It’s just doing the little stuff. We’re not doing a great job of finishing out games right now. We will come out fast, late [in the] second quarter, early third quarter, we’re always putting up a lot of points. I just think at times, we get complacent towards the end of games, and we think we got to the game won, and they get back in it right at the end. Or vice-versa. We start too slow and then we’ll be down 14 points, and we’ll put 14 points up real quick, and it’s a little too late.
Swatek: What’s the overriding emotion at the end of these games?
Poffenbarger: It really is just frustration. You get so close, you put in so much work. There’s really no word to describe what goes into a week of preparation in college football. And then the offseason is just a whole ’nother beast. So you look at these guys’ faces at the end of the games, and you see all the hard work they put in, and it’s just ... all the sprints, all the preparation during the week to come down to one point or, [like] last week, to come down to literally one inch, trying to get across a goal line, and it’s all for naught essentially. So it sucks. But we know how close we are to getting on the right side of all these close games.
Swatek: Why do you think you’re playing so well in your first season as a starting college football quarterback?
Poffenbarger: I feel like I’ve worked my tail off ever since high school. I got my dad, my parents and Middletown [that] instilled a work ethic and mentality in me that just continued on through college. And then as far as at Albany, I gotta give it all to our offensive coordinator, Coach [Jared] Ambrose [also a Middletown High grad]. He helped me believe in myself more than I already did. He runs an awesome offense that I feel like I mesh and play very, very well. And, and he lets me be myself.
Swatek: Your first game of the season at Albany, you’re named the starter and now you’re out there at Baylor. You’re in Waco, Texas, in this huge football stadium. What was that moment like stepping onto that field?
Poffenbarger: I think the best thing that I did personally, and obviously it was helped by Coach Ambrose, was just don’t make a moment bigger than it is. And don’t set expectations. Obviously, you’d like to think going into games like that, like, hey, we have a chance to win. We knew if we played absolutely perfect, zero mistakes, maybe we could have been in that game. But essentially, at the end of the day, do your best, do your job, make plays when they come to you. Don’t press. Don’t be too nervous. Obviously, it was my first college start against one of the better football teams in the entire country with [future] draft picks all over their defense. And at the end of the day, it was super exciting. I walked off that field, I really did feel like ... those guys remembered me a little bit. I didn’t play a bad game. I actually thought I played pretty well. I did what I had to do. I was out [of the game] by the middle of the third quarter just because we were trying to save some of our guys for our conference games, which obviously mean the most to us. But ... it was a really cool experience. It was a huge stadium. It was their first game, obviously. So they sold out the crowd. It was definitely a different type of football.
Swatek: Did you allow yourself to stop and take a moment and [recognize], man, I’m really doing this right now?
Poffenbarger: No doubt. When I first ran out and I went over on the sideline, just to start getting warmed up, right before the kickoff ... I took a look around, and I definitely had some butterflies. And I was like, wow, this is really happening. Your first career start. Friggin’ Baylor Bears. I grew up an Oklahoma fan, watching [Robert Griffin III] play for them. And I was just thinking about all the greats that have played in that stadium, and it was just like, this is something else. But I just really felt blessed more than anything.
Swatek: What’s the big difference between playing high school football at a high level and college football at the high level? Is it just the speed of the game?
Poffenbarger: I would say the speed of the game. But just the amount that you’re asked to do mentally is what it truly is, in my opinion. You know the game is going to be faster. There’s different high school levels where the game is faster. You know, you go to Frederick County football, and then you go up to the WCAC in Washington, and you watch DeMatha and St. John’s [in Washington] play, that’s a different speed. But there’s kids in Frederick County that can play at that level. It’s really just, in my opinion, it is mentally [what] you’re asked to do as a quarterback. Early in high school, I wasn’t really reading defenses in high school. I was just dropping back, find the open receiver, running around, not letting people tackle me — which is what I think the case is for a ton of high school quarterbacks. But once you get to college, the ones that separate themselves are the ones that dive into the film room, dive into the playbook and really understand everything that’s going on on the field. So as a quarterback, that’s definitely the biggest difference is just understanding everything that’s going on on the field and why you’re doing certain things.
Reese Poffenbarger | 2022-10-22T05:00:47Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | The Final Score podcast: Middletown grad Reese Poffenbarger is winning awards as Albany's freshman starting quarterback | Collegiate | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/collegiate/the-final-score-podcast-middletown-grad-reese-poffenbarger-is-winning-awards-as-albanys-freshman-starting/article_0ca4e5cb-2ad5-572e-917a-6c3085188aaa.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/collegiate/the-final-score-podcast-middletown-grad-reese-poffenbarger-is-winning-awards-as-albanys-freshman-starting/article_0ca4e5cb-2ad5-572e-917a-6c3085188aaa.html |
Oakdale's Dominic Nichols,middle, puts a stiff arm on Frederick High's Opanin Amponsa in the second quarter.
Frederick football continues march toward history by handling business against Oakdale
Every week seems to bring a new sense of history for the Frederick High football team.
This week, the history literally came to the Cadets, as members of the school's unbeaten 1952 team, the first high school football team in Maryland to go 10-0 in one season, showed up at practice Thursday and delivered a hand-written letter from the 12 living members to inspire the current players.
Then, Frederick went out and whipped Oakdale for a 35-14 road win Friday night that moved the Cadets (8-0) a step closer to completing an unbeaten regular season of their own.
"It's been amazing. These are a great group of kids," Frederick coach Kevin Pirri said. "There's a lot of people who are throwing a lot of words in our face, throwing a lot of different things, a lot of goals and a lot of different accomplishments, and our kids do a great job of focusing on the task at hand."
Facing a formidable Oakdale team, the Frederick defense, which has become one of the stories of the season in Frederick County football, set the tone right off the bat.
On the first offensive snap of the game, Frederick's Josh Hayward put pressure on Evan Austin and made contact with the Oakdale quarterback just as he was releasing the ball.
The hit produced a fluttering pass that was intercepted by senior linebacker Tariq Meredith, who returned it 33 yards for a Frederick touchdown.
"I [saw] the ball flying through the air," Meredith said. "I had to go attack it."
The Frederick defense has been on the attack all season. The Cadets had not allowed a point in October until Oakdale found its way into the end zone a little more than two minutes into the fourth quarter on a 10-yard pass from Austin to Hunter Thompson.
The duo connected again almost four minutes later for a second touchdown. This one covered 38 yards.
But otherwise, the Bears (6-2) struggled to move the ball against the Frederick defense, just like everyone else has.
Oakdale turned the ball over four times, including a fumble on its own 1-yard line that led to a Frederick touchdown.
The Bears had first-and-goal on the 3-yard line late in the first quarter and came away with no points.
"We were coming off the ball strong, making plays, making stops," Meredith said.
On offense, Frederick made some history, as junior running back Tae Anderson scored three touchdowns to become the school's all-time leader for rushing touchdowns with 42. He passed Andre Henry from the Class of 1988.
"It means a lot to me," said Anderson, who finished with 91 yards and the three scores on 23 carries. "I never thought I would be in this situation, to be honest."
Frederick led 27-0 before Oakdale got something going with its passing game in the fourth quarter.
With a road win over struggling Thomas Johnson (1-7) next week, the Cadets can finish unbeaten in the regular season for the first time since 1968.
"It means a lot to us," Anderson said. "We are going into the history books."
Oakdale was angry about the officiating, as the Bears feel they were on the wrong end of two bad calls they felt changed the complexion of the game.
The first was a fumble Oakdale believed it had recovered deep in Frederick territory in the second quarter that was later ruled to be an incomplete pass.
The second was a no-call on what the Bears thought was pass interference on a missed fourth-down play in the second half.
Those calls and the turnovers spelled Oakdale's demise, head coach Kurt Stein said.
"You can't do that when you are playing a good team," he said.
In Photos: Oakdale vs. Frederick High Football
Tariq Meredith | 2022-10-22T05:00:53Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Frederick football continues march toward history by handling business against Oakdale | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/frederick-football-continues-march-toward-history-by-handling-business-against-oakdale/article_e729abd0-652f-5f26-b638-00634e78fcce.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/frederick-football-continues-march-toward-history-by-handling-business-against-oakdale/article_e729abd0-652f-5f26-b638-00634e78fcce.html |
A pricey acquisition in 2021, cornerback William Jackson III has been benched and is dealing with a back injury.
Unless something significant changes, cornerback William Jackson III’s season (and perhaps career) with the Washington Commanders appears to be over. Coach Ron Rivera has declined to directly address the fact that the Commanders benched Jackson during their Oct. 9 loss to Tennessee, and Jackson recently denied the report that he’d like to be traded — but it’s clear the team’s decision to not play him is not just about his back injury.
Cleveland and Jones agreed to alter Jones’ contract, removing the nearly $12 million owed to him in 2023, which minimizes the Browns’ financial obligation to Jones and allows him to hit free agency a year sooner.
“Odds are an acquiring team would look to do the same here with Jackson, as none of that money is guaranteed anyway,” Spielberger wrote. “Furthermore, an acquiring team may also ask Washington to eat some of Jackson’s remaining 2022 salary owed, and Washington would be wise to do so if it can leverage that into a better draft pick return.”
If the Commanders were to release him this year, they would assume $13 million in “dead cap” money and save $812,500, according to the website Over the Cap. One reason Washington would consider this move would be to clear the books for next season, when Jackson is set to have a cap hit of $15.75 million, one of the most expensive in the league.
If neither happened, the Commanders would assume a $9 million dead cap hit by cutting him before June 1. | 2022-10-22T05:01:17Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | The Commanders benched William Jackson III. What comes next? | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/the-commanders-benched-william-jackson-iii-what-comes-next/article_76a58a41-7873-5c27-96e4-9412e46e64f0.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/the-commanders-benched-william-jackson-iii-what-comes-next/article_76a58a41-7873-5c27-96e4-9412e46e64f0.html |
Dualization of U.S. 15 from north of Putman Road to the Western Maryland Railroad tracks will begin next summer, Maryland Department of Transportation officials said Thursday morning in Frederick. The construction will include a 6.6-mile stretch along a much-criticized section of two-lane highway. Traffic along the highway has reached a volume that many motorists consider too heavy for a two-lane road and had led to dangerous passing situations, they say. U.S. 15 is a two-lane road for 10.4 miles, from Orndorff Road to Putman Road. The construction, through completion in 1986, is expected to cost about $20 million.
Frederick County residents are warned not to try to make friends with wild animals as more and more are becoming rabid. The warning comes from director of the Frederick County Health Department, Dr. Martha T. Schipper, in light of the recent sightings of rabid raccoons in Washington and Montgomery counties. Dr. Schipper said The Washington Post was incorrect in a story Thursday morning that stated rabid raccoons have been sighted in the county. Instead, two rabid bats were found — one in June, the other in August — but no raccoons.
The killing of a young mother and her infant daughter Saturday afternoon "clearly warrants the death penalty," Frederick County State's Attorney Scott Rolle said Monday. Sonya Marie Daniels waived extradition from Martinsburg, W.Va., on Monday afternoon and returned to Frederick County. Mr. Rolle said the gruesome vision of the victims still haunts him, and likely will never go away. "When a person with a handgun comes into Frederick County and opens fire on a 16-year-old and a baby ..." he said. "This case clearly warrants the death penalty."
WASHINGTON (AP) — A burial box that was recently discovered in Israel and dates to the first century could be the oldest archaeological link to Jesus Christ, according to a French scholar whose findings were published Monday. An inscription in the Aramaic language "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus" — appears on an empty ossuary, a limestone burial box for bones. Andre Lemaire said it's "very probable" the writing refers to Jesus of Nazareth. He dates the ossuary to A.D. 63, just three decades after the crucifixion.
Dualization Of U.s. 15
Putman Road
Rabid Raccoons
Rabid Bats
Dr. Martha T. Schipper
Frederick County State's Attorney Scott Rolle
Sonya Marie Daniels
Burial Box
Ossuary
Son Of Joseph
Brother Of Jesus
Scott Rolle | 2022-10-22T07:01:49Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | 20-40-100 Years Ago — Oct. 22 | News | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-22/article_57205d68-7ca1-5be8-b04d-36e53a0e3437.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/20-40-100-years-ago-oct-22/article_57205d68-7ca1-5be8-b04d-36e53a0e3437.html |
The yellow caution lights are flashing urgently as the fall arrives, with danger signs everywhere that COVID-19 and its deadly variants may be ready to return to sicken and kill thousands of Americans.
We’ve written this before, but it bears repeating: We may think we are done with COVID, but the virus is far from being done with us.
The New York Times reported last week:
Once again, scientists have ridden to our rescue, with a new booster shot that provides great protection from the omicron variant that has been dominant this summer. The federal government approved a booster shot in September that is overwhelmingly effective.
But only about 15 million doses of the new shots have been administered nationally, which is less than one in 10 people who are eligible, a worryingly slow start as we head into the family holiday season, when millions will gather in closed-up homes with distant relatives.
Astonishingly, many Americans say they are unaware of the existence of the new booster. A Kaiser Family Foundation survey last month reported that half of all adults said they had heard little or nothing about the shots.
Even more troubling, many of those who have heard of them seem uninterested. This is a prescription for disaster.
The Commonwealth Fund, a website that monitors public health, reported on Oct. 5: “COVID-19 vaccination has substantially mitigated the burden of COVID-19, preventing millions of deaths and hospitalizations since the first vaccines were rolled out in late 2020.”
But those shots only work if people take them, and mass immunization only helps prevent the spread if lots of people take them.
One news report from Baltimore said only about 5 percent of the city’s residents have received the latest booster. Rebecca Dineen, the city’s COVID-19 vaccine coordinator, told a reporter: “The fact that we’ve been getting it so often is making it uninteresting to people.”
That attitude is going to get people killed.
Anyone who doesn’t bother to get a booster shot — or worse, has gotten only one shot or none at all — is gambling that the virus will pass them by. If you are over 65 years old and making that choice, you are gambling with your life.
The U.S. has counted more than 1 million COVID deaths, and almost three-quarters of them occurred in people 65 or older, according to the statistics website Statista.
As of Oct. 6, around 26.7% of total COVID-19 deaths in the United States have been among adults 85 and older, despite this age group only accounting for 2% of the U.S. population, the website said. People 75 to 84 accounted for another 26%, even though they are just 4.9% of the population.
Are you getting the picture? The disease is deadly for older people, especially those not up to date on their booster shots.
Younger people should also be lining up for the boosters. Even if COVID is less likely to kill you, it can make you very sick, and a significant number of people who get the disease will struggle to recover for months or years. It is so much easier to bare your arm and get a shot.
The more people who take all of the shots and avoid getting sick, the fewer new variants will be able to circulate among the population and evolve into more dangerous forms. This is a long-term war we are waging against the virus. Everyone should join the fight.
If you are one of the people telling pollsters you have not heard much about the booster, consider yourself informed and warned. Protect yourself and those you love. Protect your community and your country.
As Gov. Larry Hogan has said: “Please, just get the damn vaccine.” | 2022-10-22T07:03:03Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | War against COVID-19 is far from over | Columns | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/war-against-covid-19-is-far-from-over/article_8518eee7-5769-51e5-a783-09d4483ec4e3.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/war-against-covid-19-is-far-from-over/article_8518eee7-5769-51e5-a783-09d4483ec4e3.html |
‘The elites plunder this country and then blame us for it in the process,” J.D. Vance, Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, declared when he announced his bid for the seat from Ohio.
Blake Masters, Arizona’s Republican senate candidate, shares a similar worldview. In his victory speech after winning the GOP nomination in August, he said that a liberal cabal runs the “newspapers and television and schools and universities — and you better believe they control Big Tech, too.” In an earlier interview, he explained that progressives not only hate America and Americans who disagree with them but the “very idea of a sovereign nation.” If their view “takes root and becomes universal,” this “globalist ideology,” he said, will lead to a “One World State, call it ‘Global Communism.’” He added, “So in my view that ideology is a pretty good candidate for the Antichrist.”
Thiel wants an escape plan if America falls apart, threatening his wealth — most of which is in an ingeniously structured Roth IRA. Well, Vance has taken the position that the U.S. government should “seize the assets” of ideological enemies that lawfully exploit tax laws to amass wealth. Bizarrely, Vance seems to think such an unconstitutional idea would never be weaponized against ideological friends when the Antichrists are in charge. Masters opposes gay marriage but not so much he declined an invitation to attend Thiel’s wedding. | 2022-10-22T07:03:09Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Why is Peter Thiel, a GOP megadonor, pursuing a Maltese passport? | Opinion | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns_syndicated/why-is-peter-thiel-a-gop-megadonor-pursuing-a-maltese-passport/article_b2a1a711-2a68-5991-b3af-df055c854717.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns_syndicated/why-is-peter-thiel-a-gop-megadonor-pursuing-a-maltese-passport/article_b2a1a711-2a68-5991-b3af-df055c854717.html |
Jan Warfield Frederick
A Republican congressional candidate at one time advocated for tattooing people infected with HIV! Parrott’s got a lot of nerve (Page A3, Oct. 6 edition of The Frederick News-Post) claiming his 2005 letter to the editor “‘called for a compassionate and serious solution’ that could protect the dignity of people who are infected while effectively preventing the spread of the disease”. To state that this is “a companionate and serious solution” is anything but. It reminds me of tattoos that were put on Jewish prisoners in Nazi concentration camps. And we all know what happened to many Jewish people during World War II. To even suggest it is horrible. I don’t care if Mr. Parrott supposedly “recanted” it 12 years ago. He wrote an editorial to the newspaper for all to see his opinion.
In 2005, there were effective medications for HIV even if they still required people to take multiple doses. President Bush had enacted PEPFAR, a much-needed program to combat HIV, in 2003. Many of us worked in HIV research. Mr. Parrott’s letter shows an incredible amount of ignorance. And this man became a state delegate?
Mr. Parrott parroted the typical line of someone who is not compassionate. We need representatives in Congress who are compassionate and care about “We the People” with all of our issues and problems.
Based on his advocacy, for example, for curbing opioid addiction, I would say Mr. Trone would fit that bill much better.
Jan Warfield | 2022-10-22T07:03:15Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Parrott suggesting HIV tattoos shows lack of compassion | Letters to the Editor | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/parrott-suggesting-hiv-tattoos-shows-lack-of-compassion/article_6ebc05d7-b14c-5c75-84dc-931f4ecfe144.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/parrott-suggesting-hiv-tattoos-shows-lack-of-compassion/article_6ebc05d7-b14c-5c75-84dc-931f4ecfe144.html |
Steve Myers Frederick
The teams with the best records in the National League (Dodgers, Braves and Mets) are out of the Major League Baseball playoffs, while two teams with barely winning records (Phillies, Padres) compete for the National League's World Series berth. Why play 162 games all year when the results mean nothing?
This is much like the Electoral College, which elects the U.S. president. While Al Gore (2000) and Hillary Clinton (2016) won the popular vote, George W. Bush and Donald Trump "won" the Electoral College. Yeah, I know the age-old spew that the Electoral College helps the impact of states like Delaware, Wyoming, etc., which is a total scam argument. My vote, your vote and votes from California, Delaware and the other 47 states should have the same weight: one vote. The Electoral College vote not only invalidates that, it puts the U.S. in the same shameful position that South Africa assumed for a long time: being governed by minority rule.
The Major League Baseball playoffs and the Electoral College: unique American scams.
Steve Myers | 2022-10-22T07:03:21Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Unique American scams | Letters to the Editor | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/unique-american-scams/article_775323f0-603b-522a-9197-39a746a606d7.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/unique-american-scams/article_775323f0-603b-522a-9197-39a746a606d7.html |
Jo Harte and Bob Horrall Frederick
As longtime inhabitants of this beautiful, complex county, we want the best for it, and know the same holds true for all its residents. That includes wanting the best possible safety, security and overall quality of life. Maybe because we both originally migrated from big cities with police departments, it took us more than a decade to realize how much the Frederick County Sheriff’s Office and who heads it matters to everyone’s confidence in countywide law enforcement and a sense that it’s being fairly and equally applied.
But after gradually becoming more aware, and learning as much as we could about the office, and about the two candidates who are currently running to lead it (one for a fourth term, the other as a third-time challenger), we became convinced that Karl Bickel was the right person for the job. So we’re asking that fellow community members who haven’t yet decided how to cast their votes — and even those who have — will consider some of the reasons why below.
Karl began gaining his experience and the respect of fellow law enforcement professionals as a street cop and detective in Washington, D.C., and later served as second-in-command here in the FCSO alongside a widely trusted and experienced former sheriff. When that sheriff retired and was succeeded by someone whose policies and practices were less compatible with Karl’s, he went on to work as a developer of innovative community policing policy in the nation’s Department of Justice and advised law enforcement agencies throughout the country on how to put it into best use.
He has also long been active in local citizen groups that support and advance the county’s social and environmental well-being. He taught state-of-the-art community policing policy and practice at local colleges, and he has been widely published and quoted in leading law enforcement management publications, as well as in mainstream journals including Parade Magazine, Newsweek, The Baltimore Sun and (honest-to-goodness) Rolling Stone.
But for us and a steadily growing numbers of others, there are two less tangible but crucially important additional reasons for wanting Karl Bickel to be our sheriff:
In making and implementing decisions about policy and practice — for example, in relation to the highly controversial and divisive 287(g) program — he trusts factual evidence of what’s true and what works above and beyond his personal beliefs and instincts. And finally, perhaps most important, his personal and professional integrity and his commitment to inclusiveness and equitability — that is, to basic fairness both in the sheriff’s office and in all the diverse communities it is pledged to protect and serve, without exception and without any willingness to tolerate collateral damage in the form of violations of civil and human rights — are unmatched.
Jo Harte and Robert Horrall | 2022-10-22T07:03:27Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Why Karl Bickel should be Frederick County's sheriff | Letters to the Editor | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/why-karl-bickel-should-be-frederick-countys-sheriff/article_1908a10c-398c-56c2-a8bd-f55d9fd04187.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/why-karl-bickel-should-be-frederick-countys-sheriff/article_1908a10c-398c-56c2-a8bd-f55d9fd04187.html |
Shawn Weimar, a muscian and luthier, was inspired by the birth of his granddaughter, Zoe, to open Zoe Guitars in Oceanside, Calif.
Nelvin C. Cepeda/The San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS
He finds his way back from son's death by making one-of-a-kind guitars
By Pam Kragen The San Diego Union-Tribune (TNS)
Seven years ago, Shawn Weimer started Zoe Guitars, a custom luthier business in Oceanside, California, named after his infant granddaughter, Zoe.
Zoe is the Greek word for “life,” which is something that Weimer almost gave up on after the accidental death of his 12-year-old son Zachary in 2008. Becoming a grandfather seven years ago gave Weimer a reason to live, and it helped him refocus his life priorities on both his family and pursuing full time his 30-year hobby of making guitars.
“When Zoe was born, I realized the last thing I wanted to do was put the burden I’d carried for so long on her shoulders. She made me want to live again. She reawakened me,” he said. “On my darkest days, I’d grab a guitar, and it would help me get through the day, so it seemed like the right name for the business.”
Weimer’s guitars, made to order from rare, exotic and ancient hardwoods from around the world, take up to three months to carve, build, inlay and finish, and they fetch up to $6,000. But they’re priceless to the professional musicians who play them, like Nashville musician Drew Holcomb, who described his Zoe guitar as an “incredible, beautiful, unique and gorgeous instrument,” and Texas singer-songwriter Zoe Zobrist, who said she loved being able to select every detail of her guitar, from the woods of the body to the neck design and the tuning pegs.
But not all Zoe Guitar buyers are professional players. Some are hobbyists who found the company’s website (zoe-guitars.com) online and are intrigued by the unique woods used in the instruments, or they’re moved by Weimer’s personal story of triumphing over grief. One of the customers Weimer is now building a guitar for is a Seattle man who recently lost his 34-year-old son. He asked Weimer to build an heirloom guitar that he can give to his grandchildren as a keepsake in memory of their dad.
“I love talking to people about guitars,” said Weimer, 59, of Oceanside. “It’s been a really cool adventure.”
Weimer grew up in Orange County and was studying advertising at a Santa Barbara arts school in 1986 when a friend’s husband taught him the basics of guitar-making in his cabinetmaking carpentry studio. An amateur musician himself, Weimer fell in love with the hobby, but set it aside to focus on building a successful media production company in Santa Maria with his wife, Sally. Their business became so successful that the Weimers recognized they weren’t spending enough time with their children, Kelly and Zachary.
So to create more family adventures and teach their children compassion and a greater worldview, the Weimers began taking humanitarian missions with their children to Guatamala, Jamaica, Cambodia and other countries for charitable causes aimed at reducing child hunger and child sex trafficking. Wherever they went, Weimer said he always brought along a guitar and gave lessons, often giving away the guitar to the students before he flew home.
Eventually, the Weimers moved their business to East Tennessee, which is where they were living when Zachary died at a church camp he was attending with his older sister. Zachary was ziplining to a landing platform when he struck a rolling staircase that should have been moved out of the way. He died from his injuries a few days later in October 2008. Weimer said he lost all interest in running his business and stepped away to focus on charity work.
Together, the couple used their media marketing skills to help nonprofits raise grant money. Then they started a university program in Hawaii with their daughter Kelly teaching college students about international cultures and religion and taking groups to Southeast Asia to teach English classes to youth in farming communities. Although the work they were doing was rewarding, Weimer said he couldn’t overcome his grief until Kelly and her husband, Daniel, had a baby.
“We enjoyed the work we did, but part of me felt like I was just keeping myself busy so I didn’t have to think about Zack. I had a gun to my head at one point and felt useless. A counselor taught me the only way to get through was to just think about taking my next breath, nothing more. But I still walked around like a zombie. Then Zoe was born.”
After making guitars and tending a vineyard in Fallbrook for a few years, the Weimers moved to Oceanside in 2020. They now run a joint studio and shop on Copperwood Way in Oceanside, where he makes guitars and she makes custom pottery. Zoe Guitar customers can buy off-the-rack handmade guitars for around $1,200, but many Zoe customers relish the idea of having their guitars built to order.
Customers fill out a 70- to 80-question survey in which Weimer determines the type of tonewoods that suit their strumming and playing style and the sound they are looking for. Some woods transmit a warm sound; others deliver brightness, earthiness and darkness. About 80% of the “color” of a guitar’s sound depends on the type of tonewood used on the face, or sounding board, of the guitar, such as Sitka spruce or rosewood. But Weimer also works with Hawaiian koa wood, Honduran mahogany, Central American cocobolo, African bubinga, South American pao ferro and New Zealand kauri wood, which is thousands of years old.
Because Weimer’s business is so unique, many customers come to watch their guitars being made, and an 18-year-old man who dreams of becoming a luthier someday is now building his own guitar under Weimer’s supervision at the studio. Sally Weimer said she has enjoyed watching her husband interact with customers and blossom as an artist at Zoe Guitars.
“It’s been fun watching his progression at something so unique. I’m absolutely amazed at the work he does,” she said.
Shawn Weimer
Key City Foundation Octoberfest 5K Fun Run
The Key City Foundation 5K Octoberfest Fun Run will be a great time for friends, family, and…
Saturday, October 22nd, 2022 @ 10:45 am – 12:45 pm
Baker Park
$50 for 5K, $25 for 1M
Music and dance in the Bomba and Plena traditions by Los Hijo 'e Plena under the stars. Bomb… | 2022-10-22T08:58:55Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | He finds his way back from son's death by making one-of-a-kind guitars | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/he-finds-his-way-back-from-sons-death-by-making-one-of-a-kind-guitars/article_303d371b-5a02-5e50-8a79-034563f6edc5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/he-finds-his-way-back-from-sons-death-by-making-one-of-a-kind-guitars/article_303d371b-5a02-5e50-8a79-034563f6edc5.html |
Rabbi Jennifer Weiner sits for a portrait in the sanctuary at Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Frederick. Rabbi Weiner is the new rabbi at Kol Ami.
Rabbi Jennifer Weiner, the new rabbi at Kol Ami, holds a shofar in a portrait at the labyrinth outside of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Frederick. The shofar, a musical horn, is sounded on High Holy Days.
Rabbi Jennifer Weiner, the new rabbi at Kol Ami, stands for a portrait while holding a shofar outside of the sanctuary at Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Frederick. The shofar, a musical horn, is sounded on High Holy Days.
Rabbi Weiner, new to Kol Ami, sees Judaism and social justice as interconnected
Tikkun olam, which translates to “repair of the world,” is a Judaism concept that refers to acts of kindness taken to mend and improve the world.
It’s a phrase found in the Mishnah, the first major work of rabbinic literature, and one that Rabbi Jennifer Weiner holds dearly.
For Weiner, who joined Frederick’s Congregation Kol Ami in July, the fight for justice is intertwined with Judaism.
The Torah teaches that everyone is created in the image of God, Weiner said. If that is true, she went on, then everyone — including people who identify as LGBTQ, those with disabilities and other marginalized communities — is equal and should be treated as much.
“We’re here as stewards of our world,” Weiner said, “to leave it a better place for our children and for their children.”
As a member of the clergy at Kol Ami, a Reform synagogue that holds services at the Unitarian Universalist of Congregation of Frederick, Weiner is looking forward to praying, learning and advocating for social justice with the synagogue’s community.
Weiner was ordained at the Cincinnati campus of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 1996. Recently, after 25 years of service to the Jewish community, she received her Doctor of Divinity from the college.
She has served congregations across the country, including in Louisiana, Nevada and New York. She has also served in the United States Navy Chaplain Candidate Corp and as a chaplain for two Virginia police departments. Before coming to Frederick, she served as an interim rabbi in Baltimore, where she guided the merging of two historical Reform synagogues, Har Sinai and Oheb Shalom. She has also served as an interim rabbi in Honolulu, Hawaii.
All were wonderful experiences that gave her the chance to meet great people, she said, but she wanted to find a congregation that would allow her more consistently to be with her husband and children in Springfield, Virginia, about an hour south of Frederick.
When she found Kol Ami, it felt like it was meant to be. The congregation is warm, inviting and welcoming, she said. It has a strong confirmation program for high school students, a Torah study class for adults and a wonderful cantorial sololist, Eric Dubbin, who everyone calls Dr. Eric because he works as a veterinarian. She feels so much positive energy and potential at the synagogue, she said. She’s excited to bring new music to services and watch them blossom.
“I’m really looking forward to our congregation being a vibrant, creative, spiritual, welcoming community where all feel comfortable to pray, to come learn about Judaism, to explore their own Judaism,” she said.
Everyone is invited, she added. Kol Ami wants to be part of the interfaith community and the wider Frederick community of Frederick, not just the Jewish community.
Weiner became a rabbi because she fell in love with the history and literature of Judaism while studying at Barnard College in New York. She loves how the religion gives her the chance to work with people and give back to a community that has given so much to her family.
Her ancestors were from Russia, Poland and Prussia, and they came to America to create lives for themselves that would be free from persecution and allow them to practice their religion “out loud,” Weiner said. The Jewish community is here for refugees and immigrants who are escaping sometimes terrible situations in their country of origin and are trying to build a better world for themselves, their children and future generations, she said, adding, “That’s very much what America afforded my family.”
Kol Ami
Jennifer Weiner | 2022-10-22T08:59:07Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Rabbi Weiner, new to Kol Ami, sees Judaism and social justice as interconnected | Religion | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/religion/rabbi-weiner-new-to-kol-ami-sees-judaism-and-social-justice-as-interconnected/article_d5c9dbb9-c30f-535b-a6b2-283fdab86388.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/religion/rabbi-weiner-new-to-kol-ami-sees-judaism-and-social-justice-as-interconnected/article_d5c9dbb9-c30f-535b-a6b2-283fdab86388.html |
Claire Starkweather Forrest poses for a photo in front of her latest exhibition, “Where Have All the Children Gone?,” at the St. James Gallery-by-the-Sea in La Jolla, Calif.
Meg McLaughlin/The San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS
What happens to a city's culture when families can't afford to live there? San Diego artist looks for answers
By Lisa Deaderick The San Diego Union-Tribune (TNS)
After moving to San Francisco in 2016, artist Claire Starkweather Forrest and family left the city a year later. The home they were staying in with their two young children, while she was pregnant with their third, was being tripled in size to be sold. This had been their fourth rental in the city, and they didn’t want to have to move their two boys yet again, so they chose to return to San Diego.
“I wondered, ‘What happens to a city when families can no longer afford to live there? What will be the long-term impact on a city when the families in the very communities that make the city a great place to raise children, have to leave? What happens to the cultural fabric of the city? What is left?’” she asked herself.
That was the catalyst for her current exhibition, “Where Have All the Children Gone?,” inspired in part by a 2017 article from The New York Times with a similar title, documenting the decrease in the number of children in the city and its implications on community and culture. The art show was recently on display at Gallery-by-the-Sea, inside St. James-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in La Jolla. Her work includes 10 drawings on paper, with two pieces on vinyl records (including a painting).
Forrest, 43, lives with her husband and their three children near Windansea beach in La Jolla. She’s worked as an art teacher, art consultant and muralist, and is a full-time fine artist and illustrator. She took some time to talk about her latest work and its focus on the costs of housing, the displacement of families, and the effects that has on culture. (This email interview has been edited for length and clarity.)
How would you describe the style of art you create?
I would describe my work as illustrations where whimsy and social issues meet.
How would you describe your point of view as an artist?
As an artist, I like to explore the various layers of meaning behind seemingly ordinary objects. So, looking at something and asking, “What is the history behind it? What does it stand for? What story does it have to tell?” For example, why do kids love their stuffed animals? They provide security and comfort when things are uncertain or scary. How many stuffed animals have comforted children who have moved out of San Francisco, out of neighborhoods they know, because of the changes occurring in the city?
Your current exhibition, “Where Have All the Children Gone?,” was inspired by your reflections on the housing market. Tell us about how you came to focus your art on this topic, and what the name of your exhibit means.
In 2017, I read “San Francisco Asks: Where Have All the Children Gone?” in The New York Times, and it really resonated with me. Someone had put into words everything we had experienced in our short time as San Franciscans. We moved to San Francisco in 2016 while the housing market was booming, and it became immediately apparent that rising costs were making it difficult for families to call San Francisco home. We had been living there for a few months when the owner of our 110-year-old, 1,200-square-foot home applied for a building permit to take the house down to the studs and triple the square footage. We thought about fighting it since it was the fourth rental we’d lived in and we didn’t want to have to move our sons again, so we talked to other families at our son’s school. They casually responded with, “Oh yeah, that happened to us, too.” One mom was a native to San Francisco and to the land as an Indigenous person and a Latina who grew up in the Mission District. She and her partner could no longer afford to live there and had moved south of the city, so they were commuting to send their son to school, wanting him to at least attend school in the neighborhood if they could no longer afford to live there. He was attending on a scholarship, and she was worried about whether the school would change its mind and ask them to leave.
We decided not to fight the building permit, and the house was later sold for $7.6 million. Although we’d been lucky to be able to move to San Francisco in the first place and to afford living there when so many could not, I remember wondering if it was possible for a family to actually live in that city or if it was reserved for the wealthy and single.
Why was housing and its relationship to community and culture something you felt drawn to express through your art?
San Francisco was not the city we thought we were moving to. Many of the neighborhoods seemed more like stages with props set up, populated by actors without any ties to the set. You can’t re-create the art of culture in a city when the very families who brought it there have left. A city like San Francisco, or any American city, loses an invaluable gift when families are forced to leave. Not only do you lose a quality of life, but you lose history.
Years before we’d moved to San Francisco, we were visiting the city with our oldest son, who was just a year old. He had a beloved lion that he took everywhere, and we were pushing him in his stroller through the heart of the city when he suddenly realized he had dropped his lion. We started to retrace our steps, but his lion was gone. I was inspired by his missing lion and the cultural and economic identity crisis that cities like San Francisco are experiencing at the moment.
What was your creative process for the work you have on display?
For me, with this series, there were two parts to my creative process. One was the actual execution of the drawings themselves. I worked with photographs, numerous studies and sketches upon sketches. Each completed drawing in this exhibition probably had at least five drafts to get it there.
The other side of my creative process is my research. I have my own personal experiences that I bring to my work, like any artist, but with this series I was constantly reading. There were newspaper articles like Fuller’s, as well as “A Changing Mission” from The San Francisco Chronicle, and “American Dream of Owning a Home, Out of Reach For Many in Tight Markets” from The Guardian, to name a few. There were also numerous books of both nonfiction and historical fiction, such as “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” by Betty Smith, “How the Word is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America” by Clint Smith, and “The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration” by Isabel Wilkerson. Then, there were the podcasts on social issues with Emmanuel Acho, Brené Brown, Aiko Bethea and Clint Smith. I was reading about the history of San Francisco, its different neighborhoods and how they were developed: the Mission District, neighborhoods being built on buried boats when they ran out of land to call home, who was allowed to purchase a home and who wasn’t and why. I was reading about the history of the land’s people — the Muwekma Ohlone people, the missionaries, “paper sons” [a term used to describe immigrants from China using false U.S. citizenship papers as a result of the discriminatory Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882], Italians, etc. Some of my most valued research I gained from the people I met and the stories they shared with me.
How long did it take from idea to completion?
I began creating these drawings in 2018 and was set to have an exhibition in 2020, but the world obviously had other plans. I wouldn’t say this series is complete. I still feel inspired by the relationship between families, urban lifestyles and culture. I don’t think that San Francisco’s problem of families leaving the city is a unique one; it’s a challenge that many cities throughout the United States and around the world are having. I have really enjoyed working on this series and diving into the research, the people I have met, the stories they have shared with me, and observing the living organism that is life in a city and how it is always changing.
What do you hope people understand about this topic as a result of viewing your art?
The paradox inherent in many American cities: the very things that make them attractive places to raise children, their history, their culture and their vibrancy are products of families who can no longer afford to live there.
Claire Starkweather Forrest | 2022-10-22T08:59:13Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | What happens to a city's culture when families can't afford to live there? San Diego artist looks for answers | Lifestyle | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/what-happens-to-a-citys-culture-when-families-cant-afford-to-live-there-san-diego/article_96c9bdfe-ee62-5c58-86b2-bd1d924bb0a4.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/lifestyle/what-happens-to-a-citys-culture-when-families-cant-afford-to-live-there-san-diego/article_96c9bdfe-ee62-5c58-86b2-bd1d924bb0a4.html |
Young campaigning to advocate for FCPS funding, addressing school overcrowding
The Frederick News-Post · In The Booth with Brad Young, candidate for County Council
Brad Young, a Democratic nominee for one of the Frederick County Council's two at-large seats, said his number-one priority would be ensuring the county keeps funding the public school system's budget much higher than the state requirements.
Young, the president of the Frederick County Board of Education, said the Frederick County Public Schools system ranks second lowest in the state in per-student funding, which has resulted in the county having among the state's lowest starting salaries for teachers.
The county must continue to grow to ensure that the county government can pay for services it provides, Young said. As a council member, Young said, he would advocate for "moderate" growth to ensure that residential development doesn't overwhelm schools that are already overcrowded.
"People don't want to buy a house and then find out their child is sitting in a portable, or that their child has to get on a bus and go to a school 20, 30 minutes away because the school right next to them doesn't have any capacity," Young said in a podcast interview with the News-Post.
The majority of the county's residential development over the last eight years was approved by the last Board of Frederick County Commissioners between 2010 and 2014, Young said. The board approved growth that has overwhelmed the county's public school capacity, despite the county constructing new, larger school buildings.
Frederick County switched from a commissioner government to a charter form of government, with a county executive and a legislative County Council, in 2014. Young's brother, Blaine, was president of the last board.
Brad Young is one of two Democratic nominees for the council's at-large seats. The second is Renee Knapp, an advocate and caregiver for her son with autism.
In his podcast interview, Young talked about why, despite being part of a family long ingrained in local politics, he waited until now to run for a county office.
Young also said he would push for the county to have strong relationships with various local nonprofit organizations, many of which Young has worked with for years. | 2022-10-23T05:02:29Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Young campaigning to advocate for FCPS funding, addressing school overcrowding | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/young-campaigning-to-advocate-for-fcps-funding-addressing-school-overcrowding/article_6aa9a218-f993-5ae1-9a70-8118d6779009.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/young-campaigning-to-advocate-for-fcps-funding-addressing-school-overcrowding/article_6aa9a218-f993-5ae1-9a70-8118d6779009.html |
Carving pumpkins is tradition on Halloween. Turnips were the material of choice in ancient Ireland, but they were replaced with pumpkins when immigrants came to America.
— Metro
A history of Halloween traditions
As with many celebrations, Halloween is steeped in traditions, many of which can be traced back quite some time. Since Halloween is believed to have originated from Celtic pagan, ancient Roman and early Christian events, its traditions are varied. Here is a deep look at some old traditions associated with Halloween.
BONFIRES: Historians trace many traditions of Halloween to a Celtic holiday known as Samhain (pronounced sow-in). The Celts lived 2,000 years ago in parts of what is now Northern France, Great Britain and Ireland. During Samhain, people believed that the door between the worlds of the living and the dead was blurred. On Samhain, Celts believed the ghosts of the dead returned. Druids made predictions about the future at this time of year. It was customary to build large, sacred bonfires and burn crops and other sacrifices to the Celtic deities.
TRICK-OR-TREATING: Christianity spread throughout Celtic regions and blended with other rituals. Pope Gregory III expanded on a holiday Pope Boniface IV established to honor Christian martyrs to include all saints and martyrs. All Saints Day on Nov. 1 commemorates the venerable saints, and All Souls Day on Nov. 2 celebrates loved ones who went on to eternal rest. All-Hallows Eve (Halloween) was a time to pay homage to the dead. Poor children would go door-to-door in more affluent neighborhoods offering to say prayers for residents’ deceased loved ones in exchange for some food or money. This was known as “souling,” which became the basis for trick-or-treating. Later the tradition became known as “guising” in areas of Scotland, where children would go around in costumes.
WITCHES: Images of witches riding broomsticks are everywhere come Halloween, and witch costumes remain a standard. Almanac.com indicates that during the Middle Ages, women who practiced divination were dubbed “witches,” from the Anglo-Saxon word “wicce,” or “wise one.” It was believed the witches could go into a trancelike state, and would do so in front of their fireplaces. Superstitious people believed the witches could fly out of their chimneys on broomsticks and terrorize others with magical deeds.
Carving pumpkins: Removing the insides of pumpkins and carving them into funny or fearsome faces may be messy work, but it’s tradition on Halloween. Turnips were the material of choice in ancient Ireland, but they were replaced by pumpkins when immigrants came to America. The “lanterns” were made with scary faces and lit to frighten away spirits.
It is impossible to identify the first Halloween costume and which masks the earliest celebrants donned in efforts to keep away evil spirits during Samhain.
According to Lesley Bannatyne, an author who has written extensively about the history of Halloween, masks and coverups were designed to symbolize ghosts and the souls of the dead, first for Samhain and later for the custom of “souling.”
Costumes of saints and evil spirits also were popular during this time. When immigrants brought Halloween customs to North America, early 20th-century costumes featured much of the same — ghosts and ghouls.
It wasn’t until the 1920s and 1930s that pop culture began to infiltrate costumes. In fact, one of the first costume companies, J. Halpern Company, began licensing pop culture images like Mickey Mouse and Popeye around this time.
By the 1960s, costumes were largely store-bought, spurring entire industries. Many 1980s kids recall buying boxed costumes that consisted of rigid plastic masks with eye holes (and very small holes by the mouth and nose) that stayed in place with thin elastic straps, and a plastic sheeting costume that went over clothes. Modern costumes are far more complex.
Classic Halloween costumes from years past
It’s no small task coming up with a memorable holiday costume. Certain costumes tie into popular culture, while others are classics that will never go out of style. Here’s a look at pop culture costumes that were trendy in years past.
• 1976: Charlie’s Angels: These empowered women crime fighters blew up on TV, and many girls wanted to be them in real life, and on Halloween.
• 1977: Star Wars characters: From Luke to Obi Wan to Darth Vader, this hit movie permanently changed popular culture and inspired Halloween costumes for decades to come.
• 1978: Michael Myers: The familiar white (William Shatner-inspired) mask became well known this year and still makes its mark on Halloween festivities more than 40 years later.
• 1981: Indiana Jones: Harrison Ford made the archaeologist/adventurer so exciting in “Raiders of the Lost Arc,” donning a fedora and brandishing a whip became very popular.
• 1982: Elliott and E.T.: Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece of a young boy and his alien friend made this a popular year for anything that had to do with the film. This included riding bicycles while wearing red hoodies.
• 1983: Princess Leia: “Return of the Jedi” introduced audiences to different sides of Princess Leia, helping to solidify her popularity as a Halloween icon.
• 1984: Freddy Krueger: This “Nightmare on Elm Street” icon caused many nightmares in real life, and his blade-tipped glove and familiar striped shirt could be seen on kids across the nation.
• 1985: Hulk Hogan: Were you dressed as Hulk Hogan? It’s likely if you were a warm-blooded boy in the mid-80s, when Hulkamania was at its peak.
• 1986: Care Bears and California Raisins: If you were young in 1986, you might have dressed up as a cuddly Care Bear or a suave, singing California Raisin. | 2022-10-23T19:17:00Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Halloween 101 | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-101/article_f56422b8-adc2-5040-989a-70c1316bd601.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-101/article_f56422b8-adc2-5040-989a-70c1316bd601.html |
Brunswick might raise taxes on vacant buildings
Brunswick is working on a plan so that downtown buildings are not vacant for long.
A building is considered vacant if it has not been occupied for at least one year.
The vote is scheduled for the next City Council meeting on Tuesday.
“This is designed to help encourage reinvestment back into downtown and get businesses back downtown,” said Bruce Dell, the city’s director of planning.
There are about eight vacant buildings in the downtown area. Dell said the owners of about five buildings are working to bring businesses into them.
In 2018, the Brunswick City Council passed an ordinance that required mixed-use and nonresidential property owners to register their unoccupied buildings and open them up to inspection. But the ordinance had loopholes, Dell said.
Additionally, Mayor Nathan Brown said, the current ordinance treats vacant buildings like municipal infractions; property owners are fined between $300 and $1,000, depending on if they have repeatedly violated the ordinance.
Since it wasn't succeeding, the city wants to change its approach.
“The new process sort of pivots to more at the root of, I think, what we're trying to get at, which is that vacant properties impact the overall economic vitality and health of a community,” Brown said.
The new ordinance offers guidelines and standards that a building must meet. If the standards aren’t met and the building isn’t occupied, the tax rate on a property will double four years after it was registered as vacant.
Then, the tax rate rises another half of a percentage point each subsequent year. The rate will be 2.5 times as high in year 5, 3 times as high in year 6, and so on.
Fines also accrue if an owner doesn't register a vacant building with the city, Dell said.
The three-year grace period should allow property owners time to renovate and occupy a building, Dell said. The time period was copied from Frederick, which implemented its new vacant building ordinance in January 2021.
Brunswick council members can discuss on Tuesday if they want to change the number of years before the tax rate changes, he said.
Dell and Brown worked closely with Marc DeOcampo, Frederick’s director of strategic planning and executive projects, to explore how Brunswick could adopt a similar ordinance to Frederick's.
Frederick is only on year two of its ordinance’s implementation, so it has not yet seen if the tax rate hike will be successful, DeOcampo said. However, it already has had success with the number of vacant building registrations.
Dell said Brunswick added caveats to address loopholes. For example, a property owner will start getting the increased tax rate after three consecutive years or three years of vacancy over a five-year period, he said.
“The reason for that piece is let's say somebody is vacant for a year, and then they do a pop-up for three months. And then they probably don't have anything for another year and a half. Our clock keeps ticking,” he said.
Repairs or renovations to a building don't count as occupancy, Dell said. The three-year clock also doesn’t reset if a property owner sells the vacant property to someone else.
“A vacant building impacts our local economy. So you need to pay your share of your impact on our local economy by offsetting the tax we're losing from your building being vacant,” Brown said.
Bruce Dell | 2022-10-23T23:13:40Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Brunswick might raise taxes on vacant buildings | Real Estate And Development | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/real_estate_and_development/brunswick-might-raise-taxes-on-vacant-buildings/article_34458f08-728f-5a6d-af0b-1f348e8cda6a.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/real_estate_and_development/brunswick-might-raise-taxes-on-vacant-buildings/article_34458f08-728f-5a6d-af0b-1f348e8cda6a.html |
Nelson Coleman Jewelers will open at 11 W. Patrick St., across from the Weinberg Center.
A longtime Baltimore jeweler currently in Towson plans to open a second location in downtown Frederick by the end of the year.
Nelson Coleman Jewelers, a sixth-generation jewelry company, will move into the space at 11 W. Patrick St., in what the company’s CEO called a return to its roots in a downtown area.
“It’s always been our dream to bring Nelson Coleman Jewelers back to the city,” Chief Executive Officer Amanda Coleman-Phelps said in an interview Friday.
Coleman-Phelps is the sixth generation of her family to be involved in the business, which was at the corner of Charles and Pleasant streets in Baltimore for more than 100 years before moving to Towson in 2002.
She said her father and uncle would tell stories about the heyday of downtown Baltimore, with their shop on a street with up to a dozen other jewelers, multiple furriers and other merchants.
As she talked with officials from the Frederick County Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Frederick Partnership and the county Office of Economic Development, she became more sure that opening a branch of about 2,000 square feet in Frederick was a way to bring the company back to its downtown roots.
While it’s considered a luxury jeweler, specializing in bridal, fashion, estate and vintage items as well as custom jewelry, it sells items from $20 and up, Coleman-Phelps said.
It also has a master jeweler at its Towson store who can do repairs, she said.
Amanda Coleman-phelps | 2022-10-24T02:43:40Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Towson jeweler plans to open shop in Frederick | Employment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/employment/towson-jeweler-plans-to-open-shop-in-frederick/article_7eaa31df-53bd-5665-93d4-bd10e065596c.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/employment/towson-jeweler-plans-to-open-shop-in-frederick/article_7eaa31df-53bd-5665-93d4-bd10e065596c.html |
This image of Quynn’s Hardware Store shows how the building appeared in 1975. The structure dates to the 1790s. However, its appearance was significantly modified with a Victorian-era storefront.
Photo from Frederick Planning Department
Quynn’s Hardware Store on 12 E. Patrick Street, now home to Sumittra Thai Cuisine, opened in 1822 and closed in 1986. This interior photograph of the employees and owners was taken around 1930. At that time it closed, Quynn’s was reported to have been the longest run commercial enterprise in Frederick City.
Courtesy photo of the Maryland Room, Frederick County Public Libraries
Quynn’s Hardware Store had a long history in downtown Frederick
By Christina Martinkosky Special to the News-Post
The building at 10-12 E. Patrick St. is the home of two popular dining establishments — Lazy Fish and Sumittra Thai Cuisine. The brick building is two stories tall and four bays wide. It is capped by a gabled roof and characterized by its Victorian-era storefront.
Longtime residents will recall the site’s earlier use as Quynn’s Hardware Store.
This commercial enterprise has the unique distinction as the oldest continuously operated business in Frederick, and potentially, the state of Maryland. For 190 years, the business was run from this single location. Newspaper records indicate that the store was established by July 1796.
At this early point in Frederick’s history, the building, much like the city, had a very different appearance.
Documentation on file with the Maryland Historical Trust indicates that the building was originally constructed as two attached dwellings, with each unit two bays wide. Both homes were set on Lot 37 and designed in the Federal style, with an all-brick façade.
The two homes would have been accessed by double-door entrance ways and fenestrated with traditional two-sash windows.
The western half of the lot was purchased by Allen Quynn Jr. in the 1790s. The home and business were presumably constructed before his untimely death in 1799.
By the end of the 18th century, Fredericktown had the look and feel of a small city active with trade, industry and politics. The growing community had a population of around 2,600 people.
When Patrick Street was incorporated as part of the National Road in the early 19th century, the Quynns’ family-owned store was well situated for business.
By 1821, the store was operated by Allen Quynn’s youngest son, Caspar. At that time, the small shop was limited to the front part of the dwelling, situated on the western half of the property.
Caspar Quynn was known for his excellent memory and became a leading resident of Frederick.
He was invested in local politics and community organizations. Quynn was a member of the Freemasons and Columbia Lodge #58, and served as president of the Independent Hose Co., Maryland’s oldest volunteer fire station.
It appears likely, under Caspar Quynn’s ownership, that the business expanded to include the eastern part of Lot 37.
A particular advertisement published in the Frederick Town Herald on Nov. 5, 1831, provides a glimpse of Quynn’s wide-ranging business, including shovels, tongs, guns and powder horns, along with curtain pins, looking-glasses and bread trays, “together with the usual variety of hardware for substantial service and ornament.”
After Casper’s death in 1847, the business remained in the family under the partnership of Gomber & Mantz. It continued under a series of ownerships until it was sold to Allen George Quynn in 1867.
For the next 110 years, the business continued as A.G. Quynn & Company. During the 19th and 20th centuries, the business evolved, with the addition of a glass storefront and a warehouse attached to the rear of the building.
The family ownership ended in 1977, when the business was transferred to William and Kathy Anders.
In April 1986, Quynn Hardware Store closed its doors for good.
Much of the building has been renovated to serve its new use. However, there is one subtle hint of the building’s early history. At the top of the east (side) elevation is an old iron hoist, used by generations of the Quynn family to lift goods for storage.
Christina Martinkosky is a historic preservation planner for the city of Frederick. She can be reached at cmartinkosky@cityoffrederickmd.gov.
Caspar Quynn | 2022-10-24T02:43:46Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Quynn’s Hardware Store had a long history in downtown Frederick | Education | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/quynn-s-hardware-store-had-a-long-history-in-downtown-frederick/article_e2f4439e-f2cf-5948-b634-2cb5302137bf.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/quynn-s-hardware-store-had-a-long-history-in-downtown-frederick/article_e2f4439e-f2cf-5948-b634-2cb5302137bf.html |
Work by Christopher Madden and S Manya Stoumen-Tolino will be shown at TAG/The Artists Gallery in Frederick from Nov. 4 to 27, with an opening reception from 5 to 8 p.m. Nov. 5. An artist talk will be held from 1 to 3 p.m. Nov. 6. Shown here, a new painting by Madden titled “Apes of Wrath,” a reflection on the Jan. 6 insurrection.
"Horse Power" — 6 to 9 p.m. Oct. 27, Artist Angle Gallery, 124 S. Carroll St., Frederick. New paintings by Rebecca Pearl. 240-285-3758 or theartistangle.com.
“Food for Thought” — through Oct. 30, DISTRICT Arts, 15 N. Market St., Frederick. There are many ways of presenting thought-provoking ideas and themes in visual art. This juried themed exhibition reflects the interpretation of this commonly used metaphorical expression in the art of 25 independently juried artists. 301-695-4050, districtarts.com.
"From the Pages of PAN: Art Nouveau Prints, 1895-1900" — through Jan. 29, 2023, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, 401 Museum Drive, Hagerstown. Brilliant lithographs, etchings and woodcuts by renowned artists such as Auguste Rodin, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Paul Signac, Georges Seurat, Käthe Kollwitz, Peter Behrens and Aubrey Beardsley, among others. PAN was an avant-garde periodical that sought to represent an overview of cutting-edge international graphic art. Works encompass the art nouveau movement, expressionism, post-impressionism, and symbolism and give a view of the both artistic and intellectual life of this period. This exhibition is from the collection of the Richard H. Driehaus Museum and is organized by Landau Traveling Exhibitions. Free admission. Hours are Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Sunday, 1 to 5 p.m. Closed Nov. 24-25; Dec. 24-25 and Dec. 31-Jan. 1. Go to www.wcmfa,org.
"Lore" — Oct. 29 through Jan. 8, 2023, Gallery 115 at the Y Art Center, 115 E. Church St., Frederick. Features 15 artists from around the world including London, New York City, Wyoming and Maryland. Artists reimagine traditional folklore and explore original contemporary myth through a variety of perspectives. Artworks include an eclectic range of media including short film and an interactive installation. Reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 30. Free parking at the back of the building. Opening reception 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 30. Artist Zoom talk noon to 1 p.m. Nov. 20. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, noon to 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. https://www.instagram.com/gallery_115_y. | 2022-10-24T05:48:47Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Art Exhibits | Visual Arts | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/art-exhibits/article_83280ebf-db1d-5da4-92a2-c2147ee88fa7.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/art-exhibits/article_83280ebf-db1d-5da4-92a2-c2147ee88fa7.html |
Commanders quarterback Taylor Heinicke (4) and running back Antonio Gibson celebrate connecting for a touchdown during the first half of Sunday’s game against the Green Bay Packers in Landover, Md.
LANDOVER, Md. — The boos started at the first half’s two-minute warning — and were followed by chants of “Sell the team!” The Washington Commanders had just thrown away another chance to score Sunday, and during the break in the action, co-owner Tanya Snyder appeared on the big screen as part of a public-service announcement about breast cancer.
The crowd at FedEx Field erupted. Had there not been so many Green Bay Packers fans in attendance, their voices would have carried even farther.
Perhaps Taylor Heinicke heard it. Not long after the Commanders returned for the second half, the replacement quarterback launched a 37-yard pass that fell into the arms of wide receiver Terry McLaurin for the go-ahead touchdown. Lifted by newfound hope, the crowd erupted once more.
After stumbling to a 0.0 passer rating early in the game amid poor throws and an interception returned for a score, Heinicke rebounded in the second half to lead the Commanders to a 23-21 win, their second in a row.
“I go out there and play like it’s my last game,” Heinicke said. “Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad, but that’s just how I play — and that’s when I think I play my best.”
The win, ugly as it was to start, improved Washington to 3-4, cast a different feel in the locker room afterward and, for the first time since a season-opening win, showed glimpses of complementary football. All three phases — offense, defense and special teams — found a groove Sunday, turning much of the pent-up frustration from the past few weeks into renewed hope.
Heinicke finished 20 for 33 for 201 yards, two touchdowns and an interception for an 85.5 passer rating, a stat line that could have been much worse.
The undrafted fan favorite, picked to start while Carson Wentz recovers from finger surgery, began Sunday’s game 0 for 4. Despite starting 15 games last season and having the most experience in this offense of any Washington quarterback, his timing clearly was off. A first-quarter pass intended for McLaurin up the middle was thrown behind the receiver and nearly got picked off. A few plays later, after the Commanders recovered a muffed punt in the Packers’ red zone, Heinicke tossed a fade to tight end Cole Turner from the 3-yard line that was too high and had too much velocity.
Washington had to settle for a field goal, trimming its early deficit to 7-3. The Commanders later squandered another gift from the Packers, an illegal contact penalty that negated a Heinicke fumble that had been run back for a touchdown.
“I was kind of panicking,” said Heinicke, who admitted he didn’t initially know a penalty had been called. “I was like, ‘Not this again.’”
Had the play stood, it would have been the second turnover the Packers directly capitalized on, following De’Vondre Campbell’s pick-six earlier in the second quarter that had put Green Bay up 14-3.
Instead, Washington, trailing 14-10 at the time, got a do-over and five free yards at the Green Bay 34. But the drive stalled — and Joey Slye hit the right upright on a 47-yard field goal attempt.
Moments later, boos rained down. Chants of “Sell the team!” followed, a troubling scenario for the franchise just days after Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay said he believes there’s “merit to remove” Commanders owner Daniel Snyder amid the team’s many off-the-field concerns.
During a pregame ceremony featuring more than 100 alumni and former cheerleaders at the stadium’s Legends Plaza, Tanya Snyder yelled, “Hail to the Redskins!” eliciting cheers from some former players. There was no attempt to correct herself after using the team’s defunct name, which made for an interesting juxtaposition to the franchise’s lengthy rebrand and insistence of culture change.
Commanders fans in the stadium issued a much louder message near the end of the first half, but their tune changed as the play improved. Late in the second quarter, Tress Way boomed a punt 68 yards that was downed at the 1-yard line, denying the Packers a late-half response.
At the start of the second half, Washington needed just five plays to reach the end zone and grab the lead. Wide receiver Curtis Samuel broke off a 16-yard run, tight end Armani Rogers added nine yards on a catch, then Heinicke threw that 37-yard rainbow to McLaurin.
“When I knew the go route was on and I saw man [coverage] with no help, I don’t really take it as, ‘Oh, they’re disrespecting me,’” McLaurin said. “But at the same time, you see that, and you’re like, ‘Wow, this is a great opportunity for myself.’ . . . Taylor couldn’t have done a better job of putting the ball where it needed to be. He almost just walked it to me. It fell right out of the sky. I told him that was the best rep we’ve had since we’ve been together.”
Coach Ron Rivera credited Heinicke’s “underdog mentality” for his second-half turnaround.
“You look at the things that he does and the way he handles it, understanding what his mistake was, understanding what he had to correct,” Rivera said. “It’s all about timing. . . . You see it with the timing on the throw to Terry. It was about as good as it gets right there.”
The touchdown was a jolt to the Commanders and put the momentum squarely in their favor as quarterback Aaron Rodgers’s frustration with his receivers mounted for the scuffling Packers, who have lost three in a row. Washington’s defense fed off the energy and quickly forced the Packers (3-4) off the field so the Commanders could notch another scoring drive, a clock-eating march that ended with Slye’s 31-yard field goal to make it 20-14.
As Washington’s offense has waffled between bad and abominable for much of the season, its defense has steadily improved. The line was the only one in the league to feature three players — tackles Jonathan Allen and Daron Payne and end Montez Sweat — with 20 or more quarterback hits through Week 6. In a win at Chicago the previous week, the defense’s goal-line stops were the difference. On Sunday, its stop on a Green Bay fourth down staved off the Packers before another late in regulation sealed the win. Washington also held the Packers to 0 for 6 on third down.
When the Commanders failed to punch the ball into the end zone after making it to the Green Bay 2-yard line early in the fourth, Slye knocked in a 19-yard field goal to expand their lead to two scores at 23-14. But that left plenty of time for some late-game magic from Rodgers. Sure enough, the Packers responded with a 21-yard touchdown toss to Aaron Jones to close the gap to 23-21, leaving close to four minutes for the Commanders to burn.
Enter McLaurin, whom Washington signed to a three-year, $71 million extension this past offseason. For weeks, Rivera and offensive coordinator Scott Turner said the team had to find a way to get McLaurin the ball earlier and more often.
Heinicke found him for a 14-yard catch on a critical second and six, sparing the Commanders another third and long that probably would have led to a punt. When they did fall into third and long three players later, McLaurin came up big again, catching a 12-yard lob from Heinicke in tight coverage that moved the Commanders to the Green Bay 44-yard line.
“When you make that play it’s just like: ‘Dang, this is what you’ve been working for. This is what you’ve been waiting for,’” McLaurin said. “I just hope that continues throughout, not just for me but our whole receivers group because I genuinely feel like we have a dynamic group that can make big plays down the field.”
The catch pushed McLaurin past the 3,500-yard career mark in receiving and all but ensured a victory. It also incited the crowd at FedEx Field again — this time with chants of “Ter-ry! Ter-ry!
After a late punt pinned Green Bay deep without any timeouts, the Commanders staved off a last-gasp hook and lateral from the Packers, who tried to zigzag their way into the end zone as time expired. When the mayhem ended, high-fives and cheers came from the stands as Commanders fans headed for the exits. | 2022-10-24T05:50:12Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | With Taylor Heinicke in charge, Commanders find a way to rally past Packers | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/with-taylor-heinicke-in-charge-commanders-find-a-way-to-rally-past-packers/article_ab47e259-59b8-57bd-8f97-ce84a067d4e2.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/with-taylor-heinicke-in-charge-commanders-find-a-way-to-rally-past-packers/article_ab47e259-59b8-57bd-8f97-ce84a067d4e2.html |
I am a devout, practicing Jewish woman of almost 89 years. Growing up in an almost entirely Jewish neighborhood in Baltimore, my religion was never a problem. Most of us knew that there were sections of the city where Jews could not live, but we accepted that fact. So until I reached college age, I never encountered antisemitism.
As I became more aware of where I went, where I traveled, whom I met, I soon realized that there were people who scorned my religion and the people who practiced it. No one gave me any advice about how to deal with hatred towards Jews, and my strategy was just to avoid people and places where I was not wanted. Thank goodness, that changed.
Younger, stronger, more determined and able people began to fight bigotry, not only in my city but everywhere. When it was exposed that the Nazis annihilated 6 million people in World War II, and Harry Truman recognized the State of Israel, being Jewish became a right and a privilege.
Jews won Nobel Prizes, made many significant discoveries, were authors, composers, statesmen, advisers to the President, prominent lawyers, physicians, inventors, and their work was heralded here and abroad. Yes, there were still people who harbored a distinct hatred of Jews, but we all hoped that they were in the minority. Now, many years later, antisemitism has again raised its ugly head and become a scourge, not only here but all over the world. Prominent people are espousing despicable speeches and remarks about Jews.
The Anti-Defamation League said that in April that there were over 2,717 reports of incidents of assault, vandalism and harassment of Jews in 2021, and the numbers are rising. People like Kanye West, now called Ye, are spearheading campaigns against the Jewish people (doesn’t Ye know that Jews were the first to march with Blacks to end racial segregation?), and unfortunately he is not the only “celebrity” to do so.
Closet antisemites are appearing regularly with remarks that are insidious and very hurtful. Hating a religion and those who practice it cannot be tolerated! I now live in a building in a fine community, where I am the only Jewish resident. In the past seven years, my neighbors have been the kindest, accepting, tolerant people anywhere. I am truly puzzled why uninformed, intolerant people need to find a scapegoat for the problems facing us today. And as one person who reveres her religion and is saddened by this new hatred of my kinsmen, I am at a loss at what actions I can take to dispel this animus. When troubled, I always turn to prayer: Let those who are wiser, more prominent, more respected speak out loudly, and try your damnedest to fight this new epidemic of hatred ... not only of Jews but of all religions, large and small! Amen.
Have you prepared for trick-or-treaters?
Yes; I’ve got the candy picked out and the decorations all set up
Not yet; I still have to pick up some treats
Trick-or-treaters aren’t common in my neighborhood
No; I’m not available to give out treats on the holiday | 2022-10-24T08:34:17Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | The rise of antisemitism | Letters to the Editor | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/the-rise-of-antisemitism/article_3a1e6908-ce73-56e7-89a7-dc763bdef654.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/letter_to_editor/the-rise-of-antisemitism/article_3a1e6908-ce73-56e7-89a7-dc763bdef654.html |
Trick-or-treaters in downtown Frederick in 2021.
Celebrate Halloween in downtown Frederick from 10 a.m. to noon Oct. 29. All ages are welcome, and costumes are encouraged for this family-friendly event hosted by the Downtown Frederick Partnership.
Trick-or-treat around town at more than 60 downtown shops and restaurants, who will hand out candy and treats while supplies last.
After you’re done going door to door, enjoy other Halloween-themed activities around downtown, including a Halloween craft station at 30 N. Market St. and a vintage VW Trunk-or-Treat from 10 a.m. to noon at Everedy Square.
Bring chairs and blankets to watch the Pixar classic “Coco,” which will be screened outside at the Carroll Creek Amphitheater at 7 p.m. Gates open at 6 p.m.
For a full listing of events and participating trick-or-treat locations, visit downtownfrederick.org. | 2022-10-24T21:07:13Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Halloween in Frederick: Trick-or-treat at 60+ downtown businesses | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-in-frederick-trick-or-treat-at-60-downtown-businesses/article_a93bd036-e47d-543a-8239-488993be2589.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-in-frederick-trick-or-treat-at-60-downtown-businesses/article_a93bd036-e47d-543a-8239-488993be2589.html |
This combination of images shows promotional art for the documentary “A Tree of Life: The Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting,” on HBO Max, left, "Barbarian," the low-budget indie horror available on VOD, center, and “The Good Nurse,” premiering Oct. 28 on Netflix.
Wendell, voiced by Keegan-Michael Key, left, and Wild, voiced by Jordan Peele in a scene from "Wendell & Wild."
New this week: Scary movies and TV shows
In the new Netflix film “The Good Nurse,” Jessica Chastain plays an overworked ICU nurse and single mother who, after a patient’s death, starts to suspect things about about her new colleague Charlie, played by Eddie Redmayne. Danish filmmaker Tobias Lindholm directed the thriller off of a script “1917” and “Last Night in Soho” screenwriter Krysty Wilson-Cairns.
For something more family-friendly, Netflix also the stop-motion animation pic “Wendell & Wild,” featuring the voices of Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele as demon brothers. It’s an original idea from director Henry Selick, who also directed the spooky but kid-friendly classics “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and “Coraline.”
For some fresh Halloween scares, several well-reviewed thrillers are hitting video on demand this week. First up is “Pearl,” Ti West’s technicolor horror prequel starring Mia Goth as a farmgirl in a pandemic plagued Texas town in 1918 whose dreams of movie stardom drive her a bit mad. There are references to everything from “Singin’ in the Rain” to “The Wizard of Oz,” but with a sinister, murderous edge. Before the film’s premiere at the Venice Film Festival earlier this fall, West said, “I just had this interest in making, for lack of a better term, a children’s movie that has a more demented adult story to it.” Goth helped write the script too, which involves an epic monologue at the end done in almost a single take.
Also coming to VOD is “Barbarian,” the low-budget indie horror starring Justin Long that became a sleeper hit at the box office. “Barbarian” stars Georgina Campbell as a woman who is inadvertently double booked with a stranger (“It’s” Bill Skarsgård) in a creepy Detroit-area Airbnb run by Long’s character, a TV actor facing sexual misconduct allegations. Writer-director Zach Cregger said he pitched the movie, which has an unconventional structure that essentially resets itself midway through, to every studio that’s made a horror in the last 15 years and everyone said no. To date, it’s made over $40 million against a $4 million production budget.
Get in the Halloween mood with Netflix’s “Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities,” an anthology produced by the Oscar-winning filmmaker with the aim of challenging “traditional” expectations of horror. The eight stories include “The Autopsy,” based on a Michael Shea short story and starring F. Murray Abraham, Glynn Turman and Luke Roberts; the H.P. Lovecraft-based “Dreams in the Witch House,” with Rupert Grint and Ismael Cruz Cordova, and “Lot 36,” one of two episodes based on an original story by del Toro and starring Tim Blake Nelson and Elpidia Carrillo. Episodes are being released daily in pairs.
“Putin’s Attack on Ukraine: Documenting War Crimes,” debuting on PBS’ “Frontline,” details the toll of Russia’s war on Ukraine and the challenges of holding Russia to account for its actions. The documentary is part of a collaboration between “Frontline” and The Associated Press that includes gathering, verifying and cataloging potential war crimes and co-publishing stories and videos from AP and “Frontline” war reporting. The joint initiative, which includes the War Crimes Watch Ukraine interactive experience, has documented more than 500 incidents involving potential war crimes since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last February.
A gunman’s deadly attack on a house of worship, its causes and the aftermath are examined in HBO’s “A Tree of Life: The Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting.” The film, directed by Trish Adlesic, delves into the 11 lives that were lost in the October 2018 tragedy and the effect on family members, survivors and the community at large. The attack also is viewed in the context of rising hate speech and actions. Michael Keaton, Billy Porter and Mark Cuban, the film’s prominent executive producers, are natives of the Pittsburgh area. An original song, “A Tree of Life,” is performed by Broadway and film star Idina Menzel. | 2022-10-24T21:07:19Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | New this week: Scary movies and TV shows | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/new-this-week-scary-movies-and-tv-shows/article_4c3e61bf-741e-51b4-80b4-13264397036f.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/new-this-week-scary-movies-and-tv-shows/article_4c3e61bf-741e-51b4-80b4-13264397036f.html |
The National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony in 2021.
Celebrate the 100th National Christmas Tree Lighting at President’s Park
Join the National Park Service and the National Park Foundation this holiday season to celebrate the 100th lighting of the National Christmas Tree on Nov. 30.
Free tickets to the National Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony are awarded through an online lottery, which opened on Oct. 25 and closes at 10 a.m. Nov. 1. To enter the lottery, visit recreation.gov and click “TICKET LOTTERY,” or call 877-444-6777. Lottery applicants will be notified about their ticket status on Nov. 8.
This year’s event marks the 100th lighting of the National Christmas Tree. President Calvin Coolidge celebrated the first National Christmas Tree Lighting in 1923. Presented by the National Park Service and the National Park Foundation, this American tradition features musical performances and the official ringing in of the holiday season.
The public can see the National Christmas Tree and the 58 trees decorated by states, territories and schools managed by the Bureau of Indian Education and the Department of Defense Education Activity.
Dates to know:
Nov. 30: National Christmas Tree will be lit for the 100th time
Dec. 11: CBS Network will broadcast the National Christmas Tree Lighting special at 8 p.m.
National Christmas Tree Area | 2022-10-24T23:47:31Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Celebrate the 100th National Christmas Tree Lighting at President’s Park | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/celebrate-the-100th-national-christmas-tree-lighting-at-president-s-park/article_8fe8990e-2993-516c-ba41-db986675437b.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/celebrate-the-100th-national-christmas-tree-lighting-at-president-s-park/article_8fe8990e-2993-516c-ba41-db986675437b.html |
Lt. Jeff Null retired Friday after 20 years with the Frederick County Sheriff's Office.
Null most recently was the sheriff's office's training services commander, according to a news release from the agency.
He trained new recruits and did continuous training with deputies. He also helped train deputies in Carroll, Washington and Howard counties, the release said.
Null created the sheriff’s office’s entrance-level training academy.
The academy helps recruits prepare for the police academy, Todd Wivell, a sheriff's office spokesman, said. Since it was created, the release said, the sheriff’s office hasn’t lost a single recruit to a physical fitness test or injury.
The Body-Worn Camera Unit, which has been running trials since January on which body cameras deputies should use, is one of the many efforts Null oversaw during his tenure, the release said.
He also led many successful search and rescue missions as the lead search manager for Frederick County.
Null, a former basketball player at Mount Saint Mary's University, was the Fraternal Order of Police president for one year, negotiating the largest pay raise for deputies at the time, the press release said.
He also secured money and support for families of fallen deputies and formed a sheriff’s office retirement committee to make sure retiring members are properly honored. He worked with the Tunnel to Towers Foundation — a nonprofit to help first responders and their families — to get mortgages paid off for families of fallen first responders, the release said.
Null's many accolades at the sheriff’s office include the Outstanding Performance Award twice. The first was in 2005, the release said, after he caught two people at a traffic stop who were wanted in four states for more than 30 armed robberies.
The second was in 2014, when he de-escalated a situation of an armed suicidal person, without any problems or injuries, the release said.
Jeff Null | 2022-10-24T23:47:37Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Null retires after 20 years from sheriff's office | Cops And Crime | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/null-retires-after-20-years-from-sheriffs-office/article_43d2d869-926c-5113-9e3a-141158c2ef92.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/null-retires-after-20-years-from-sheriffs-office/article_43d2d869-926c-5113-9e3a-141158c2ef92.html |
MTC is the state’s largest technology and life sciences trade association, the news release said.
Schulz ran this year against state Delegate Dan Cox for the GOP gubernatorial nomination. She lost by roughly 16 percentage points.
Schulz was Maryland's labor secretary from 2015 to 2019, then commerce secretary from 2019 to 2021.
Schulz represented Frederick County as a state delegate from 2011 to 2015.
Maryland Tech Council | 2022-10-24T23:47:49Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Schulz will be CEO of Maryland Tech Council | Science & technology | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/science_and_technology/schulz-will-be-ceo-of-maryland-tech-council/article_7d82a3b1-7007-5ffe-b02d-8ddc9f3e880d.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/science_and_technology/schulz-will-be-ceo-of-maryland-tech-council/article_7d82a3b1-7007-5ffe-b02d-8ddc9f3e880d.html |
Frederick County Executive Jan Gardner speaks at a press conference at Winchester Hall on Monday. She mentioned three possible options for a new library branch on the west side of Frederick.
County to examine options for new west side library
Frederick County officials will consider three options for a new library on the west side of Frederick and have planned a meeting in November to hear from the public.
County Executive Jan Gardner laid out several possibilities Monday for a 15,000-square foot facility along Frederick's Golden Mile corridor.
Two options would put the new library in the city's Westside Regional Park, the location some city officials prefer. A third option would put it on a county property along Himes Avenue, where the county originally planned to build.
In a letter to Frederick Mayor Michael O'Connor dated Monday, Gardner said the county prefers one of three possible sites identified by the city in Westside Regional Park, where the city is adding amenities.
One option would involve building the library on a site behind Butterfly Ridge Elementary School in fiscal year 2025. But Gardner said that would mean the city would contribute about $3.6 million to accelerate the process of constructing parking and other work that would need to be done.
Another option would push development of the same site behind Butterfly Ridge Elementary School back to fiscal 2028 or later, and having a temporary satellite location at the county's Himes Avenue property, which has been named Prospect Center.
A third option would renovate part of the Prospect Center property, a 209,000-square-foot facility the county purchased in 2021 after leasing it for a mass COVID-19 vaccination site. Construction on that site would begin in fiscal 2025.
The county will host a public meeting at 6 p.m. on Nov. 16 at Hillcrest Elementary School to review the possibilities.
County Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer, who is running for re-election in Council District 3, where the new facility will be located, urged residents to come to the Nov. 16 meeting and make their opinions known.
“This is your opportunity to come and hear and let us know what your thoughts are,” she said Monday.
Several of the city aldermen, who would have to approve a change in zoning for the Himes Avenue site, have expressed a preference for the site off Contender Way in Westside Regional Park.
Alderwoman Katie Nash said Monday that it is good news that Gardner is considering the park site as an option, and she's eager to hear more at the November meeting.
Nash said the aldermen have heard from area residents that they want more amenities nearby.
With the new information from the county, the city will have to hold meetings of its own to talk about which option is preferred, she said.
Alderman Ben MacShane questioned the value of Gardner making the announcement only two weeks before an election that will determine her successor.
The county has had eight years to invest in families on the city's west side, and making an announcement now is “basically irrelevant,” he said.
“Let's see what the next county administration wants to do,” MacShane said.
O'Connor said any decision by the city on a preferred option is unlikely before the county meeting in November.
In the last round of conversations, any location other than the Himes Avenue site was only theoretical, so the city offered to identify possible sites, O'Connor said.
The city's schedule for workshops and meetings makes it unlikely that it arrange a discussion before the county meeting unless the aldermen insist on having one, he said.
O'Connor said he has no preference for a site, and is “more interested in a process.” He said he would like to see the results of a county feasibility study to see if a location can meet the needs of the community.
Gardner said her administration has tried to advance library services throughout the county, with new facilities in Walkersville and Myersville, a renovated branch in Point of Rocks, and work underway on a new branch in Middletown.
Frederick County Public Libraries | 2022-10-25T02:12:43Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | County to examine options for new west side library | Services | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/services/county-to-examine-options-for-new-west-side-library/article_20dac3b2-6dc5-5bb7-91e3-da0e57d8184c.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/services/county-to-examine-options-for-new-west-side-library/article_20dac3b2-6dc5-5bb7-91e3-da0e57d8184c.html |
The Oakdale High School Cheerleading Team won the Frederick County championship on Monday.
LEFT: Urbana High School’s team.
Asked how it felt to hear her team announced as the winners, Oakdale head coach Courtney Devine used just one word.
“Crazy,” she said simply.
Oakdale placed fourth at last year’s county championship, Devine said. And even though she was pleased with the team’s performance Monday, she didn’t expect them to finish on top.
Devine has been dealing with a challenging pregnancy this season, she said, and her squad has had to overcome a spate of injuries and illnesses.
That made Monday’s win all the more satisfying, said senior Caitlin Perry.
“I’m so excited,” she said, smiling. “It’s like all the work from the past four years paid off.”
Perry is a backspot, meaning she stands on the ground behind the flyer — the girl who is tossed up into the air — ready to catch her when she comes down.
Cheerleaders have to rely on each other for safety in a way that most other athletes don’t, said Terra Williams, the head coach for TJ’s varsity team.
“There’s a level of trust that I don’t think you get in any other sport,” Williams said. “And it builds this beautiful, beautiful sense of community.”
Williams, a first-year teacher at TJ, saw the team perform at a competition last year. It unlocked memories of her own youth, when she spent eight years cheerleading.
“I just fell in love with it all over again,” Williams said.
Candice Wells, a senior on Williams’ team, said she wasn’t totally satisfied with their performance Monday. The team can do better, she said.
Williams agreed. One of the girls’ stunts hadn’t gone as planned, even though they’d executed it perfectly earlier that day.
“The thing about cheerleading is you can hit it 200 times, and then not hit it once,” she said. “I hope they know all their hard work isn’t in vain. We’ll come back tomorrow, and we’ll run it again.”
Eight varsity teams from across Frederick County Public Schools — Tuscarora, Frederick, Oakdale, Urbana, Linganore, Middletown, TJ and Catoctin high schools — competed Monday.
South Hagerstown and Boonsboro high schools each also sent a varsity squad for a separate Washington County competition. Boonsboro won.
Linganore placed second in Frederick County on Monday night, and Urbana placed third.
The top eight teams in the Western Maryland region will advance to a regional competition in Bel Air next month. FCPS athletes have to wait for other counties to hold their championships before they know if they qualified.
Monday was the first time since the pandemic that county cheerleaders could compete at championships in a typical environment, without masks or crowd restrictions.
“It’s definitely better without the masks, because you can perform to your full potential,” said Middletown senior Rylee Lucido. “And you can breathe better, too.”
Lucido’s teammate Hannah Lynch, also a senior, said Monday was the first time in her four years that the team had a successful performance at the county championships.
“They left everything on the mat,” said Middletown head coach Shannon Schneider. “They did everything I could have asked them to do.”
Courtney Devine | 2022-10-25T04:21:37Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Oakdale squad wins FCPS fall cheerleading championship | Education | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/oakdale-squad-wins-fcps-fall-cheerleading-championship/article_3375df78-fc58-53cf-8824-a7089a5ad8a5.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/education/oakdale-squad-wins-fcps-fall-cheerleading-championship/article_3375df78-fc58-53cf-8824-a7089a5ad8a5.html |
BOARD of CONTRIBUTORS I Patricia Weller
In late September, we went to Deep Creek Lake with our daughter and son-in-law for a mini-vacation, a four-year tradition that we always looked forward to eagerly. Before we began that tradition, we vacationed in Deep Creek Lake for several years with extended family (about 14 of us). Occasionally, we would hit it just right and be treated to autumn’s stunning colorful beauty along the way, with ooh’s and aah’s escaping from our mouth around every curve of the road.
We had hoped to witness that beauty again this year, but autumn’s pallet was, I suppose, delayed in part by climate change. I’m just beginning to see autumn’s potential beauty now around our own area.
As I’ve mentioned before, we moved to Frederick County, just outside of Emmitsburg in 1998. For the most part, our small corner of the world is peaceful, mostly mountains and trees, and alive with wildlife. We liked the area as soon as we moved here, but admittedly, it didn’t take us long to take it for granted.
When we were both working, weekends were our thing. We’d often hit the city of Frederick for breakfast, followed by a visit to Barnes & Noble and Wonder Book and Video. We even did some of our grocery shopping in Frederick. Other times, we would go out to dinner either in the city or in other areas of the county. Some of our favorite restaurants were La Paz, Outback, and Pargo’s in Frederick, with Gladchuck’s as our go-to restaurant for special occasions. A few others that we frequented were The Village Tavern in Walkersville, Stavros in Emmitsburg, and Bollinger’s Restaurant in Thurmont. Although we visited these restaurants frequently, we often tried new ones as well.
By the time the pandemic hit, my husband and I were both retired. Staying closer to home, we realized that we had been neglecting our little corner of the world. It didn’t take us long to reintroduce ourselves to the immediate surroundings.
In doing so, we developed a new-found contentment with the small town of Emmitsburg and the nearby mountain on which we lived. We started taking “Sunday drives” any day of the week (after all, we are retired), and almost always noticed something new around us. We enjoy looking at farms, the scenery and foliage of each season, and the abundance of deer, wild turkeys, cranes, hawks and other birds. My husband has even seen a bear.
When we first moved here, I never expected to be swept up by Emmitsburg’s small town charm. Over the past few years, Emmitsburg has added a Dunkin’ Donuts and a Dollar General, with no negative effect on the town’s charm.
This fall though, according to Emmitsburg mayor Donald Briggs, a new Rutters will open up at the east end of town, at the intersection of U.S. Route 15 (Taneytown Road/Md. 140 Exit) and Harney Road, to be more specific. It looks like Rutter’s is getting closer to its grand opening every day.
As reported, there is also land for sale or rent near the new Rutters, so there is the potential for other businesses to settle in that same area. We will see what happens there in terms of traffic in and out of town, and we will, of course, see if this small town can hold onto its charm against such a mega addition.
Emmitsburg is not a sleepy town. It’s vibrant. It has nearby Mount St. Mary’s University, the Fire Academy, and the National Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Seton.
Up on the mountain, you can see Rainbow Lake, Summit Lake Camp, and if you hurry, you will find the beauty autumn has to offer before all the leaves are underfoot.
I was born and raised near Chicago. When I was nine, we moved to Brainerd, Minnesota. From there, we moved to Glen Burnie. After I married, I lived in Bordentown, New Jersey, for a few years. Our family car trip travels took us around the country and into parts of Canada as well.
Yet the contentment I feel now with where I am is solid. I can’t imagine living anywhere else.
Patricia Weller can be reached at jpwburg2 @gmail.com | 2022-10-25T08:25:44Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Appreciating where you are | Columns | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/appreciating-where-you-are/article_782645b0-ddea-5371-b3a1-2e30963ff652.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/opinion/columns/appreciating-where-you-are/article_782645b0-ddea-5371-b3a1-2e30963ff652.html |
Jeff Cosgrove on drums, Brad Linde on saxophonist (seated) and Mark Lysher on bass.
Joe Crocetta
The first concert will run from 7 to 9 p.m. Oct. 28 with a $10 suggested donation at the door. All proceeds will go to the Frederick Rescue Mission, and folks from the organization will be onsite to answer questions.
The band will be Jeff Cosgrove on drums, Brad Linde on saxophone and Mark Lysher on bass. These musicians have played together for more than 10 years and have developed a strong musical connection.
Remaining concerts in the Jazz Journey series will be on Nov. 25 (Blake Cramer/vibraphone, Will Yager/bass, Jeff Cosgrove/drums) and Dec. 16 (Erin Connelly/trumpet, Derrick Michaels/sax, Tony Martucci/drums, Jeff Cosgrove/drums).
Each concert runs from 7 to 9 p.m. and features a different band and a different charity being supported by the suggested donation.
Jeff Cosgrove | 2022-10-25T14:49:14Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | New jazz series in Brunswick | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/new-jazz-series-in-brunswick/article_e7c9c2bf-1dc2-5eaa-92ad-4a15ac423ea1.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/new-jazz-series-in-brunswick/article_e7c9c2bf-1dc2-5eaa-92ad-4a15ac423ea1.html |
A scene from “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.”
Halloween night film: ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’
Catch a screening of the 1920 film “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” at the Weinberg Center for the Arts as part of its Silent Film Series.
In the film, hypnotist Dr. Caligari uses a somnambulist, Cesare, to commit murders. The film stars Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt and Friedrich Feher and runs just over one hour.
The film will be accompanied by the Wurlitzer organ at the Frederick screening at 8 p.m. Oct. 31 at the Weinberg Center, 20 W. Patrick St., Frederick.
Tickets start at $4 and can be purchased online. | 2022-10-25T21:36:12Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Halloween night film: ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari’ | Arts & entertainment | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-night-film-the-cabinet-of-dr-caligari/article_cb9bfe5e-ab3a-528c-abbe-8bb547e661d2.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/arts_and_entertainment/halloween-night-film-the-cabinet-of-dr-caligari/article_cb9bfe5e-ab3a-528c-abbe-8bb547e661d2.html |
Filming could disrupt parking in downtown Frederick
A film production could disrupt parking in parts of downtown Frederick on Friday evening and into early Saturday morning.
The city is working with Bard Tale Productions and others to approve a permit for filming from 7 to 11 p.m. Friday on sidewalks in the 100 block of South Market Street and from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. on sidewalks in the 100 block of East Church Street, according to a press release from the city.
There has been a request for an off-duty police officer and vehicle for the Church Street filming, and the vehicle may have its lights on or flashing during the filming, according to the release.
Bard Tale Productions
Cinematic Productions | 2022-10-25T23:38:13Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Filming could disrupt parking in downtown Frederick | Cops And Crime | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/filming-could-disrupt-parking-in-downtown-frederick/article_3fb939ba-8222-5457-b71b-7e2f072eeb83.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/crime_and_justice/cops_and_crime/filming-could-disrupt-parking-in-downtown-frederick/article_3fb939ba-8222-5457-b71b-7e2f072eeb83.html |
Brunswick votes to raise taxes for vacant properties
The Brunswick City council voted unanimously Tuesday to pass an ordinance targeting habitually vacant buildings in its downtown, so they won't remain vacant for long.
"This is a long time coming," Councilman Christopher Vigliotti said after the vote.
Buildings that aren't occupied for at least one year will be considered vacant.
Mayor Nathan Brown said in an interview last week that the new ordinance takes a different approach from the current ordinance, which treats vacant properties like municipal infractions. The new ordinance should address the root of the vacant building problem, he said.
The ordinance sets up a process of registration, inspection and maintenance for nonresidential vacant buildings. Additionally, it creates a new tax class for vacant buildings if property owners don't occupy them after three years.
The three years can be consecutive or they can be cumulative during a five-year period, according to Bruce Dell, the city's director of planning. During those three years, property owners are expected to try to get their properties occupied.
Starting in year four, property owners will be taxed at a rate double the standard property tax. With every year the building remains vacant, the tax-rate multiplier goes up, first to 2.5 times, then 3 times, and so on.
The maximum tax in the ordinance is at year 10, when it would be five times the normal property tax rate.
With the ordinance passing, vacant property owners will be required to register their building by Dec. 1, 2023, or within 30 days of when they receive a vacant building notice, the ordinance says.
Those who fail to do so will be fined $500 for a first offense, and will continue to be fined until they register their property, the ordinance says.
Additionally, the property owner must register their vacant building annually while it is vacant, the ordinance says. The annual renewal fee is $100.
There was a public hearing for the ordinance prior to the vote, but no one spoke.
Other aspects of the ordinance try to close what the city has described as gaps in its current ordinance. For example, if a building is undergoing repairs or renovations, it does not count as occupancy and does not pause the three-year time frame.
Additionally, if a building is sold to another individual, the three-year clock doesn’t reset with the new owner. | 2022-10-26T01:34:16Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Brunswick votes to raise taxes for vacant properties | Real Estate And Development | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/real_estate_and_development/brunswick-votes-to-raise-taxes-for-vacant-properties/article_8ec5838e-26aa-5c16-b851-2230b6a0263a.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/economy_and_business/real_estate_and_development/brunswick-votes-to-raise-taxes-for-vacant-properties/article_8ec5838e-26aa-5c16-b851-2230b6a0263a.html |
Rose Chaney, an African American Resources, Cultural and Heritage Society board member, puts flowers at a gravesite after a reinterment and monument dedication in honor of the historic remains recovered from Greenmount Cemetery and reinterred at Fairview Cemetery. The remains were discovered during recent construction operations at Frederick Health Hospital.
Frederick Health and the African American Resources, Cultural and Heritage Society dedicated this monument in honor of the historic remains recovered from Greenmount Cemetery and reinterred at Fairview Cemetery. The remains were discovered during recent construction operations at Frederick Health Hospital.
Protean Gibril, left, president of the African American Resources, Cultural and Heritage Society, and the Rev. Mark Groover of Asbury United Methodist Church lead a ceremony to reinter remains at Fairview Cemetery on Tuesday. The remains, of an individual, were recovered from Greenmount Cemetery in April.
Frederick Health reinters remains from former cemetery
Until about a century ago, some of the land where Frederick Health Hospital stands today — along West Seventh Street in downtown Frederick — served as the final resting place of more than 900 people of color.
Greenmount Cemetery, established in the late 1800s, was once one of three graveyards where people of color could be buried in Frederick. But in 1920, the grounds were sold to what is now known as Frederick Health Hospital.
A few years later, hundreds of graves were moved to Fairview Cemetery, a graveyard purchased in 1923 by a committee of local African Americans, according to previous reporting from The Frederick News-Post.
In the decades that followed, however, as the local hospital broke ground to expand, workers found human remains, headstones and other artifacts near the site where Greenmount Cemetery once stood. All remains, according to Frederick Health, were moved to Fairview Cemetery on Old Gas House Pike.
Most recently, a person’s remains were discovered during construction at Frederick Health Hospital in April. And on Tuesday afternoon, they were returned to the earth at Fairview Cemetery through a partnership between Frederick Health and the African American Resources, Cultural and Heritage Society.
“We can’t touch dirt without finding a remain,” Frederick Health President and CEO Tom Kleinhanzl said during the reinterment ceremony. “And it’s hard. It’s hard when you uncover it. It’s hard to recognize that that was there.”
When looking at the headstones at Fairview Cemetery, Kleinhanzl said, he thought he recognized the surnames of people who work at the hospital today.
Frederick Health Hospital and AARCH previously worked together in 2017 to create a memorial garden outside the facility to honor and remember the people who were once buried at Greenmount.
And on Tuesday, the health system and AARCH dedicated another monument at Fairview Cemetery to the people of color who had been laid to rest at Greenmount.
AARCH and Frederick Health invited members of the public and descendants of those buried at Greenmount to the event.
During the dedication ceremony, Protean Gibril, president of AARCH, asked members of the audience to consider what African American burial grounds mean to them.
Chased from their homes by racial terrorism, many Black Americans throughout history have been forced to leave their ancestors behind, where they were buried, Gibril said.
Following the request of longtime AARCH member Rose Chaney, Gibril shared a message based on a quote by Maya Angelou.
“History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived. However,” Gibril said, “if faced with courage, it needs not to be lived again.”
Gibril and Seavan Gordon, vice president of AARCH, thanked Frederick Health for its partnership.
The organizations will continue working together in the future, Gibril said. Frederick Health may, down the road, partner with AARCH on a documentary and on pieces for the organization's museum, which is a work in progress.
In Gordon’s remarks, however, he asked the elected officials in the audience to “fast-track” laws to prevent other cemeteries from being sold for development, as Greenmount was more than a century ago.
He brought up his two great-granddaughters, who are 3 and 6 years old.
“I don’t want them to have to call me 50 years from now and tell me, ‘Granddaddy, they are now moving the bodies out of Fairview and moving them someplace else,’” he said. “Please, please, elected officials, do something now about that.”
Frederick County Councilwoman Jessica Fitzwater, who attended Tuesday's ceremony, said she believes there are already rules in the county that would prevent graveyards from being disturbed.
“But,” she added, “if it’s not already on the books, we certainly need to look at it, and also see if there’s actions to advocate for on the state level.”
After being invited to speak by Gibril, community organizer Watu Mwariama voiced anger at the disruption that has been weathered by Greenmount Cemetery during Frederick Health's construction.
Many of his ancestors were buried at Greenmount, and later reinterred at Fairview, Mwariama said. In a list of more than 900 people laid to rest at Greenmount, the surname “Hill” — Mwariama’s last name before he chose an African name for himself — appears 17 times.
Mwariama said he was “awestruck” by the partnership between AARCH and Frederick Health.
“I can’t see anything honorable about desecrating hundreds of bodies like that,” he told the audience. “We don’t treat our deceased people that way.”
Mwariama, a member of the Frederick community organization Suns of Reawakening, read aloud a short list of demands to the people in attendance.
He and other members of Suns of Reawakening want a moratorium on new construction at Frederick Health “to protect the desecration of further Black bodies buried within its confines.”
He also asked Frederick Health to use ground-penetrating radar and hire a trained archaeologist to be a part of any future work that might disrupt the former cemetery.
And, Mwariama said, the group wants a map that details all original gravesites of people buried at Greenmount, and where those people are now buried at Fairview.
He said the group wants to sue Frederick Health to stop it from undertaking further construction.
Besides the ongoing project to expand the hospital’s emergency room and build a new intensive care unit and cardiac catheterization laboratory, Kleinhanzl said, Frederick Health has no future construction planned at the hospital’s site.
To the health system’s knowledge, he added, there is no map like the one Mwariama described.
“I respect his comments immensely,” he said. “We’re trying to identify ways to grow respectfully and with dignity and with the foresight to do things the right way.”
The health system did use ground-penetrating radar during its last excavation, said Michael McLane, vice president of support services at Frederick Health. Because the remains had been buried for a long time, however, the radar did not reveal anything.
Still, the health system knew there was a chance it would encounter remains, McLane said.
“We took painstaking measures to make sure that anytime we put a shovel in the ground, as soon as we uncovered remains, we stopped the project, and we began to dig with hand shovels to make sure that every remain we came across,” he said, “we were able to preserve as much as possible.”
Frederick Health Hospital
Aarch | 2022-10-26T01:34:28Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Frederick Health reinters remains from former cemetery | Hospitals And Doctors | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/hospitals_and_doctors/frederick-health-reinters-remains-from-former-cemetery/article_af48b2d3-92b3-5fbd-8c37-05104e6a419c.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/health/hospitals_and_doctors/frederick-health-reinters-remains-from-former-cemetery/article_af48b2d3-92b3-5fbd-8c37-05104e6a419c.html |
Aloi campaigning to advocate for lower property tax rate
The Frederick News-Post · In The Booth with Shelly Aloi, candidate for County Council
Shelley Aloi, the Republican nominee for the District 3 seat on the Frederick County Council, said that a lower property tax rate would improve the quality of life for people.
Frederick County's property tax rate has remained at $1.06 per $100 of assessed value for more than a decade. Aloi said the county should lower its rate to the constant-yield tax rate, which is the property tax rate necessary to generate the same revenue from year to year.
"People just need a break," Aloi said in a podcast interview with the News-Post.
Aloi said the county should examine whether it has hired too many government employees since 2014, when the county switched from a commissioner-led system to a charter form of government with a county executive and a legislative County Council.
When asked about the bills she would look to introduce as a council member, Aloi said, "That's gonna come from the people. That can't just come from me."
Aloi, the executive director of the Marriage Resource Center of Frederick County, is not a stranger to local politics.
She was a member of the Frederick Board of Aldermen from 2009 to 2013. She ran for mayor of Frederick in 2017, but lost in the Republican primary to then-incumbent Mayor Randy McClement. Mayor Michael O'Connor, D, won in the general election.
In 2014, Aloi ran for Maryland lieutenant governor on a ticket with gubernatorial candidate Ron George, who represented Anne Arundel County in the House of Delegates from 2007 to 2015. Gov. Larry Hogan, R, and Lt. Gov. Boyd Rutherford won the primary and went on to win the general election.
This year's General Election Day will be Nov. 8. Early voting will be from Oct. 27 to Nov. 3, and the Maryland State Board of Elections has begun sending mail-in ballots to voters.
In her podcast interview, Aloi also talked about what it's been like campaigning for local office while recovering from a concussion she suffered in a car crash in December.
Aloi said she has mostly recovered. Her neurologist informed her that lingering headaches she has experienced should be gone by December, when the next council is expected to take office, she said. | 2022-10-26T03:24:20Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Aloi campaigning to advocate for lower property tax rate | Election Coverage | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/aloi-campaigning-to-advocate-for-lower-property-tax-rate/article_9dcf168d-0b0d-5657-b5f8-f34c9050d204.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/election_coverage/aloi-campaigning-to-advocate-for-lower-property-tax-rate/article_9dcf168d-0b0d-5657-b5f8-f34c9050d204.html |
Council approves Sugarloaf plan but leaves development rules for next council
The Frederick County Council on Tuesday unanimously voted to pass a plan to preserve Sugarloaf Mountain and the land that surrounds it, but it pushed a decision on development restrictions in the area to the council that will take office in December, following the Nov. 8 general election.
The decision concludes, for at least the next two months, a two-and-a-half year process to preserve nearly 20,000 acres in total.
The county held its first public meeting for the plan in February 2020.
With the plan now void of the overlay zoning district that outlined standards for the scale, intensity and impact of development and prohibited certain land uses, some council members weren’t sure what was left of the plan to vote on.
“I don’t know what a vote in favor of the plan means,” other than supporting a pretty book, said County Councilman Steve McKay, R.
As part of the Sugarloaf plan, the council approved land-use changes for 34 properties in the Sugarloaf area. Most of the changes are from agricultural uses to rural residential, which is for housing in rural areas.
Before voting to approve the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan, the council voted 4-3 to remand the overlay back to the county’s Planning Commission, which held nearly a dozen workshop meetings on the Sugarloaf plan between September 2021 and July before forwarding the plan to the County Council.
Representatives for Stronghold, the nonprofit organization that owns Sugarloaf Mountain, had said the organization would close the mountain to the public if the council passed a plan that included its land in the overlay.
Sugarloaf Mountain will remain open to the public.
Because the overlay was not a part of the plan when the council voted on it, there is no reason to close the mountain, John Webster, president of the Stronghold Board of Trustees, said in a phone interview with the News-Post.
Webster said he did not understand the need for the county to adopt a preservation plan for the mountain, considering that Stronghold was founded in the mid 20th century specifically to preserve the mountain.
He said it’s “ludicrous” that people would think the organization has plans bring development to the mountain.
“The public has trust issues,” he said.
In a statement from Stronghold, spokesperson Beth Levine wrote, “for three years we laid out our concerns to the county and the numerous organizations claiming to know what’s best for our private property, only to be ignored.”
“It didn’t take long to see that our own county government had no intention of working with us, but instead was singularly focused on their own desired result,” she wrote.
The council cannot vote on legislation past Oct. 31 — the final day, per the county’s charter, to pass legislation before a new council takes office in December.
The council was divided about what remanding the overlay could mean for the plan as a whole.
“Any remand, in my opinion, presents a clear and present risk that this plan may never come back” to the council for a vote, McKay said.
Council President M.C. Keegan-Ayer, D, said that any member of the next council could propose an overlay zoning district like the one in the Sugarloaf plan. It would not have to be a part of the Sugarloaf plan for a council member to introduce it, either, she said.
Four of the seven council members — Keegan-Ayer and Councilman Jerry Donald, both Democrats, and Republicans McKay and Councilman Phil Dacey — are running for reelection.
Councilwoman Jessica Fitzwater, D, who proposed remanding the overlay to the Planning Commission, voted in favor of the proposal along with Keegan-Ayer, Dacey and Vice President Michael Blue, R.
McKay, Donald and Councilman Kai Hagen, D, who said Fitzwater’s proposal was “grotesquely irresponsible,” voted against it.
Officials from the Frederick County Building Industry Association and the Frederick County Association of Realtors, and some individuals who own large tracks of land in the Sugarloaf area, had for months called on the council to remand the plan back to the county’s Planning Commission.
But, Sugarloaf residents who for months have called on the county to pass a plan that would impose strict development limitations and include Stronghold’s land were outraged.
“What a colossal waste of a huge amount of good work,” said Steve Poteat, who lives in the Sugarloaf area, in a statement from the Sugarloaf Alliance, a nonprofit organization that formed in 2014 to protect the character and public use of Sugarloaf Mountain and the surrounding area.
Before voting to remand the overlay, the council voted 4-3 to oppose an amendment that, according to Hagen and McKay, would have kept the overlay in the plan but exempted certain areas from its development restrictions.
Stronghold’s 3,400 acres in the plan area would have been among the areas exempted from the overlay restrictions.
Under the proposal, which Hagen and McKay proposed, land that is zoned for Resource Conservation, which allows for low-intensity land uses and activities compatible with resource preservation, and which Hagen said is the county’s most strict zoning classification, would have been exempt from the overlay restrictions.
“This plan is not perfect for anybody in the room, probably,” Hagen said. “It’s not perfect for me either.”
The vast majority of Stronghold’s land is zoned Resource Conservation.
Any change in zoning, though, would have subjected the land to the overlay restrictions, Hagen said.
Hagen, who was the council member most outspoken in his support for the Sugarloaf plan, said he introduced the amendment because there had not been four votes in favor of passing the plan in the weeks preceding Tuesday’s decision.
Keegan-Ayer, Blue, Fitzwater and Dacey voted against the amendment. Hagen, McKay and Donald voted in favor.
County Executive Jan Gardner, D, who does not frequent the council’s weekly meetings, but who initiated the county’s process to draft the Sugarloaf plan, said that Hagen’s amendment went against the intent of the plan.
“While I appreciate out-of-the-box thinking and understand how we got to this proposed amendment to the overlay tonight, I have to just go on record as saying I’m disappointed in it,” she said, later adding, “I do hope you will adopt something.”
Jessica, MC and Jan getting together and making a plan is not quite the same as Democracy.
(JF… Time to start shopping for your school supplies)
“Stronghold, spokesperson Beth Levine”….
https://www.kopublicaffairs.com/beth-levine | 2022-10-26T03:24:32Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Council approves Sugarloaf plan but leaves development rules for next council | Sugarloaf | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/council-approves-sugarloaf-plan-but-leaves-development-rules-for-next-council/article_9a9ce91b-ca5a-5859-8527-32476468f2c1.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/council-approves-sugarloaf-plan-but-leaves-development-rules-for-next-council/article_9a9ce91b-ca5a-5859-8527-32476468f2c1.html |
Council passes nine bills, including one to slow development where roads are congested
The Frederick County Council on Tuesday voted to pass a bill that will require large developments to adhere to a higher standard for easing traffic. It was one of nine bills the council approved during the meeting.
Tuesday was the last council meeting scheduled before Oct. 31, the final day, per the county’s charter, for the council to pass legislation before a new council takes office in December.
The bill will change the county’s adequate public facilities ordinance, which the county relies on to ensure that development does not overburden roads and intersections, as well as schools and water and sewer infrastructure.
The council was scheduled to vote on McKay’s bill in July, but after receiving feedback from the county’s Planning Commission and members of the local development community, the councilman decided to withdraw the bill and reintroduce a version that incorporated recommendations from the Planning Commission.
The bill establishes a threshold for the county Planning Commission to approve a fee paid to an escrow account to help fund large-scale traffic projects that might be beyond the scope of a single developer to address.
The payment must be at least 5% of the project cost. A previous version of the bill required that the payment be a minimum of 10% of the total cost. The county’s code doesn’t currently list a minimum payment.
The bill also increases the transparency of traffic impact analyses, which assess how a new development might change traffic congestion of nearby roads and intersections. The analyses must be posted on the Frederick County website, according to the bill.
The council voted 6-1 in favor of McKay’s bill. Councilman Phil Dacey, R, was the lone dissenting vote.
The council voted to approve eight bills in addition to McKay’s.
A “private park” use classification will be added to the county’s code. The county’s planners devised the classification as part of the Sugarloaf Treasured Landscape Management Plan to let Stronghold, the nonprofit owner of the mountain, request to add resources and facilities to the mountain if the plan were to pass. The classification will not automatically apply to any properties. The council voted 6-1 to pass the bill.
The county will grant an exception to the rule that no more than five lots may use a common driveway. Council members granted the exception to a property owner on Twin Ponds Lane in Frederick. The council voted 6-1 to pass the bill.
People who relocate their home from one piece of property in the county to another will be exempt from impact fees the county charges for developments. The council voted 6-1 to approve the bill.
The council authorized the county to borrow up to $100 million to sell bonds to finance long-term projects. The council voted unanimously to pass the bill.
The council voted unanimously to update the code that outlines the county’s procurement process.
The council voted unanimously to update the county’s finance and taxation code.
Beginning July 1, 2023, the county’s retirement plan for non-uniformed employees will include a permanent cost-of-living adjustment tied to annual changes in the Consumer Price Index, with a minimum adjustment of 1% per year and a maximum of 3%. The change will eliminate the need to review the employees’ cost-of-living adjustment every three years. The council voted unanimously to approve the bill.
The council voted unanimously for an identical bill that changed the cost-of-living adjustment for uniformed county employees, which includes law enforcement officers, correctional officers, and fire and rescue personnel. | 2022-10-26T03:24:38Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Council passes nine bills, including one to slow development where roads are congested | Sugarloaf | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/council-passes-nine-bills-including-one-to-slow-development-where-roads-are-congested/article_e5e69c2a-7c4c-527e-b74b-7c251f3c74dc.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/news/continuing_coverage/sugarloaf/council-passes-nine-bills-including-one-to-slow-development-where-roads-are-congested/article_e5e69c2a-7c4c-527e-b74b-7c251f3c74dc.html |
Oakdale's Ryan O'Neal spikes the ball over Catoctin's Lily Bingman in the first set Tuesday night. O'Neal finished with 18 kills.
Her turn to hit: O'Neal fills in as hitter and piles up kills to lead Oakdale volleyball over Catoctin
THURMONT — Since cracking the Oakdale varsity volleyball team’s lineup two seasons ago, senior Ryan O’Neal has been a rock-solid setter for the Bears.
No one ever questioned her value to the team. Nonetheless, she always longed to try another position.
“Ever since I was a freshman, I’ve wanted to hit so bad,” she said.
The Bears gave O’Neal the chance to do that very thing on Tuesday, when they were missing a couple of front-row players for health reasons, and she made an immediate impact at her new role.
Piling up a team-high 18 kills and getting the first triple-double of her varsity career, O’Neal led Oakdale to a 23-25, 25-23, 25-16, 25-22 win over Catoctin.
Aside from her kills, O’Neal had 18 assists and 16 digs. As her assist total suggests, she still performed the job she’s been known for at Oakdale for years as the Bears switched from their usual 5-1 rotation to a 6-2.
“We’ve been going back and forth through the year about whether or not we wanted her to hit,” Oakdale coach Jim Dorsch said. “She wanted to hit badly.”
Recent circumstances opened the door for O’Neal to hit, something she does in club volleyball during the winter and spring.
For starters, when O’Neal missed time earlier this season with an injury, Kelly Banks emerged as a viable option at setter.
And for Tuesday’s match, Oakdale’s front row was missing two players. Faith Miller was out with a sprained ankle, and Naomi Jarboe was sick.
“So we were down to, ‘This is the lineup we have to play guys,’” Dorsch said. “And they did a great job.”
O’Neal consistently pounded spike kills. But given her history as a setter, she was quick to share credit with Banks, who had 16 assists along with three kills herself.
“This is the first time I’ve done it consistently the entire game,” she said of hitting. “But when you have a setter like Kelly putting perfect balls up ...”
Zoe Vance had 20 digs for the Bears (7-7). Kay Angeh had nine kills and two blocks. Ireland Payne had eight kills and 10 digs.
All of the aforementioned Bears and others helped their team bounce back from a tough first-set loss to the Cougars.
“I think we came out a little slow at first,” O’Neal said. “But we kind of realized, all right, it’s our last [regular-season] game, we’re on the road, we haven’t had a win in a couple games, we really need this.
“We really came together today,” she said. “We’ve had a little rough patch. But today we just kind of kicked it in gear and flicked the ‘ON’ switch, I guess.”
Anna Belluomo had 16 kills for Catoctin. Michaela Windisch had 20 assists. Abby Moreland had 16 digs. Abby May had 12 digs. Makenzie Orndorff had 10 digs.
In Photos: Catoctin vs. Oakdale Volleyball | 2022-10-26T05:12:18Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Her turn to hit: O'Neal fills in as hitter and piles up kills to lead Oakdale volleyball over Catoctin | High School Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/her-turn-to-hit-oneal-fills-in-as-hitter-and-piles-up-kills-to-lead/article_a0f8a464-0126-5749-9137-f9a504be7357.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/high_school/her-turn-to-hit-oneal-fills-in-as-hitter-and-piles-up-kills-to-lead/article_a0f8a464-0126-5749-9137-f9a504be7357.html |
Commanders defensive tackle Jonathan Allen (93) and defensive end Montez Sweat (90) are part of a defense that has the second most quarterback hits (55) in the league.
Commanders predicted their defense would 'clean up,' and they were right
“A big part has obviously been how we’ve played on first and second down, not being in third-and-shorts as much, but being more in a third-and-medium to third-and-long,” Rivera said Monday. “I think that helps. Obviously, it helps with the pass rush.”
Last season, no defense fell into third-and-short (defined as third down with 4 yards or fewer to go) more than Washington’s, which averaged more than six such plays per game. Through seven games this season, it has averaged only four plays on third-and-short per game.
“We have been able to contain in our gaps, and ... for the most part, those guys get vertical and get the ... push they need,” Rivera said Sunday. “I know today they did not get a sack, but if you watch them, they affect the quarterback, and if they can do that, that’s a huge plus.”
“I think you know what it tells you: They didn’t need to,” Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers said. “That’s what they thought: The rush could get home, and they pressured enough and were covered on the back end. ... They ran man coverage maybe one or two times. It was all two highs, some match, occasional drop down safety, but they didn’t really do a whole lot.” | 2022-10-26T05:12:24Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Commanders predicted their defense would 'clean up,' and they were right | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/commanders-predicted-their-defense-would-clean-up-and-they-were-right/article_673bd114-d420-5fcd-a4ca-a30136c958ea.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/commanders-predicted-their-defense-would-clean-up-and-they-were-right/article_673bd114-d420-5fcd-a4ca-a30136c958ea.html |
Washington re-signed Marcus Johansson to a one-year deal in the offseason.
“I’m comfortable anywhere on this team I think,” Johansson said. “Of course you want to have responsibility and all that, but whatever it takes to help the team win. It is just fun to be out there, and I think everyone wants to play as many minutes as possible. It has been a good start so far, but got to win a few more games.”
“When I came I felt like I wanted to be here, and this is where I enjoyed myself and enjoyed playing hockey,” Johansson said. “I definitely wanted to come back. I think there were other teams involved and stuff, but this is where I want to be, and my family, so that was never a doubt in my mind.”
After the Capitals’ power play was 0-for-9 to start the year, Washington added Johansson to the first unit and dropped Evgeny Kuznetsov to the second unit. The change has worked.
“I feel like [he’s good at] getting the puck in the zone and really understanding what the forecheck is going to do, where the areas are to find and get open, and once we get in the zone, [he can] get us to where we want to be,” Capitals assistant coach Blaine Forsythe said. “The more clean entries that we get, the more time we spend in the zone so it’s important.”
“It is a lot of fun, and that is why I’m here,” Johansson said. “It’s to play hockey. I’m enjoying it. I love playing hockey with this team and in Washington. I enjoy every day of it.” | 2022-10-26T05:12:31Z | www.fredericknewspost.com | Marcus Johansson exceeding expectations in happy return to Caps | Professional: All Sports | fredericknewspost.com | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/marcus-johansson-exceeding-expectations-in-happy-return-to-caps/article_cda48410-0e8d-5c1c-ba46-a304aa2455de.html | https://www.fredericknewspost.com/sports/level/professional/marcus-johansson-exceeding-expectations-in-happy-return-to-caps/article_cda48410-0e8d-5c1c-ba46-a304aa2455de.html |
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