Legum’s New Line

Attorney General Doug Gansler says he supports tightening evidence requirements in death penalty cases, but the bill working through the General Assembly is “clumsy” and needs to be “reworked or abandoned.” Any amendments to the bill would likely kill the effort, as Senate President Mike Miller has announced his chamber is done debating the issue this year. [Washington Post]

The State Senate approved a ban on driving while texting. [WBAL]

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) goes off on AIG for awarding large bonuses to executives. Cummings “sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, asking that Treasury do everything in its power to keep bonus payments to AIG as low as possible, or possibly eliminate them.” [Maryland Politics]

Outgoing Salisbury mayor identifies a great danger to the future of the city: bloggers. [Eye on Annapolis]

Maryland is “among the top five states reporting the highest incidents of mortgage fraud.” [WBAL]

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Michael Steele, former Lt. Governor of Maryland and now chair of the Republican Party, recently guest hosted Bill Bennett’s radio show. During the show, he announced his belief that the earth is cooling. HuffPost has the transcript:

We are cooling. We are not warming. The warming you see out there, the supposed warming, and I am using my finger quotation marks here, is part of the cooling process. Greenland, which is now covered in ice, it was once called Greenland for a reason, right? Iceland, which is now green. Oh I love this. Like we know what this planet is all about. How long have we been here? How long? No very long.

It’s worth noting that, among the scientific community, the fact that the earth is warming is not the subject of any debate. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a group of hundreds of distinguished scientists, concluded in 2007 that “Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice and rising global average sea level.” The panel concluded that it was “very likely” that most of the warming since the mid-20th century was due to human activity.

The head of Republican party, apparently, does not have much use for science.

Also, as Huffington Post notes, Greenland’s “name was derived…from Erik the Red, who wanted to trick people into going to that island as opposed to the more hospitable Iceland.”

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O’Malley abandons his effort to repeal the death penalty this year. [Maryland Daily Record]

Room for improvement on state transparency. Maryland ranks 18th in the nation on making records public online, according to the 2009 Survey of State Government Information. [Baltimore Sun]

Poultry farmers complain about new federal rules that restrict the runoff of chicken manure into the Chesapeake Bay. Agriculture, including poultry farms, is the number one source of pollution in the Bay. [WTOP]

A new focus for Steele. RNC Chair Michael Steele, reeling from several controversial television appearances, turns his attention to fundraising. [WBAL]

Anne Arundel County faces a $116 million budget shortfall. County Executive John Leopold is considering layoffs. [Baltimore Sun]

The Maryland Zoo in Baltimore is open for business. The zoo, which is the third oldest in the country, stayed closed longer than usual this year due to financial difficulties. [WJZ]

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The Baltimore Sun, following up on a story broken by the New Line, confronted Rep. Don Dwyer (R-Anne Arundel) about his split from the GOP caucus. At first, Dwyer clams up completely. Eventually, he confirms he will no longer caucus with the GOP but refuses to elaborate. Here’s the exchange:

Smitherman: Are you leaving the Republican Caucus?

Dwyer: No comment.

Smitherman: Are you still a member of the Republican Caucus?

Dwyer: No comment.

Smitherman: That raises more questions than it answers.

Dwyer: I can say I am still a member of the Republican Party.

Smitherman: I don’t understand why you can’t say you’re a member of a caucus.

Dwyer: I can say I will no longer be attending the meetings.

Smitherman: Can you say why you won’t be attending those meetings?

Dwyer: Oh no.

Dwyer also confirmed to the Washington Post that he “no longer plans to caucus with the group” but told that paper’s reporter “I’m not discussing this issue with anybody, at any time.”

Yesterday, the New Line reported that, according to General Assembly sources, Dwyer became upset with the GOP caucus after the group refused “to support his ‘personhood’ amendment to the Maryland constitution.”

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Former Rep. Wayne Gilcrest (R) comes to Annapolis to testify in support of same-sex marriage. [Baltimore Sun]

Maryland has lost 39,000 jobs since January 2008 [Gazette.net]

The Maryland House of Delegates revives a controversial domestic violence bill that would allow subjects of temporary restraining orders to have their records expunged. [Baltimore Sun]

Michael Steele “clarifies” his position on abortion, saying he opposes it and that Roe v. Wade should be overturned. A day earlier he said abortion was an individual choice. [MSNBC]

Kellogg, which dropped spokesman Michael Phelps after a photo of him smoking a bong surfaced, donates two tons of cereal boxes with Phelps’ image to a San Francisco food bank. [USA Today]

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The New Line has learned from multiple sources that Delegate Don Dwyer (R-Anne Arundel) has left the Republican caucus. The news was confirmed by Delegate Wayne Norman (R-Harford).

Delegate Dwyer, one of the General Assembly’s most conservative members, was apparently upset when the caucus refused to support his “personhood” amendment to the Maryland constitution. The bill would “define anything from a fertilized egg through a full-term fetus as a person,” widely viewed as “a strategy for effectively outlawing abortion.”

You can read the text of the legislation here.

A request by the New Line for comment from Mr. Dwyer was not immediately returned.

Stay tuned for more details.

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Tumbling tax revenues have created a “$515 million shortfall” in Maryland’s budget. Gov. O’Malley says the new data sends the state’s efforts to balance the budget “back to the drawing board.” Worker layoffs and tuition hikes, which O’Malley hoped to avoid with the help of federal stimulus, are back on the table. [Baltimore Sun]

Environment Maryland, a prominent environmental group, says that the state’s “Smart Growth” program has failed to reduce suburban sprawl over the last decade. [Maryland Moment]

Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon’s trial for “theft, perjury and misuse-of-office” is tentatively scheduled for early September. [Baltimore Sun]

A hole in a pipeline that carries coal ash from a paper plant in Luke, Maryland spilled 4,000 gallons of ash slurry into the Potomac River. [Bay Daily]

Annapolis considers using eminent domain to regain control of the city’s iconic Market House. The building has lost nearly all its vendors amid botched repairs and a legal dispute between the city and privately contracted managers. [The Capital]

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Revenues from slot parlors in Maryland, approved by referendum last November, are lagging far behind projections. Today, the effort was dealt another blow. New data shows gambling revenues nationwide are plummeting. Bloomberg has the details:

Casino gambling revenue dropped 15 percent on the Las Vegas Strip in January and tumbled 19 percent in Atlantic City last month as the U.S. recession curbed spending on travel and betting.

…Betting proceeds at Atlantic City, New Jersey, the second- biggest U.S. casino center, fell to $310.3 million. Revenue from tables at the seaside town’s 11 casinos fell 20 percent to $96 million, while slot-machine play contracted 19 percent to $214.3 million, the New Jersey Casino Control Commission said today in an e-mailed statement.

The Maryland Daily Record asks: “At this point, why would any company want to put up the substantial capital necessary to open a slots parlor in Maryland?”

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A new report by the National Center on Family Homelessness finds there are 12,810 homeless children in Maryland. [WBAL]

The Chesapeake Bay restoration effort goes high tech. Maryland is using satellites to monitor a cover crop program designed to reduce nutrient pollution from farms. [PA Farm News]

The ACLU obtained records from the Maryland State Police showing that files were kept on at least 20 political groups considered “potential security threats.” The groups included “the anti-war group Women in Black and the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization.” [AP]

Santa Bob busted. A retired high school teacher and ecologist in Hartford County, Robert Chance, received 18 months probation for growing marijuana and possessing psychedelic mushrooms on his farm. Chance was known as “Santa Bob” to children who visited his farm to buy Christmas Trees. [Baltimore Sun]

Arbitron, the company that tracks ratings for radio programs, is moving its top executives from New York to Columbia, Maryland. [Gazette.net]

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According to new reports, Annapolitan J. Charles Fox will be tapped to run the beleaguered Chesapeake Bay Program at the Environmental Protection Agency, reporting directly to to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

The program has been the subject to intense criticism recently as the EPA has repeatedly failed to meet pollution reduction goals. In January, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation sued the EPA for failing to enforce the Clean Water Act.

More details and reaction from the Baltimore Sun:

Fox, 48, an Annapolis resident, ran the Maryland Department of Natural Resources from 2001 to 2003. He served as an assistant state environment secretary and held several posts with the EPA in the 1990s, including assistant administrator for water. He also worked briefly for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and most recently had been senior officer with the Pew Environment Group, an arm of the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Bay Foundation President William Baker said he believed it would be “very significant” to have someone like Fox overseeing the federal bay cleanup effort, particularly if he reports directly to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson – as is said to be the case.

…In congressional testimony last year, Fox, then with Pew, called for boosting the bay cleanup through increased enforcement of pollution laws, as well as increased funding and accountability of cleanup efforts.

More background on Fox here.

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