Despite an historic national decline in the rate of homelessness across the U.S., Baltimore’s homeless population continues to grow.  The most recent report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) reveals that Baltimore’s homelessness population this year is 2725, up 6% from 2014, the last year Baltimore completed the count of homelessness.

Nationwide the rate of homelessness declined by 3% between 2015 and 2016, according to the most recent Annual Homeless Assessment. Homelessness has declined overall by 14% since 2010, the year the Obama Administration launched Opening Doors, the nation’s first comprehensive strategy to prevent and end homelessness, according to HUD.

Betsy DeVos is hardly a household name, but the Michigan billionaire and conservative activist has quietly helped change the education landscape in many states, spending millions of dollars in a successful push to expand voucher programs that give families taxpayer dollars to pay for private and religious schools.

Now DeVos is poised to spread her preference for vouchers nationwide. President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday named her as his nominee for education secretary, a pick that suggests he aims to follow through with campaign promises to expand the movement toward “school choice” — including vouchers and charter schools — in an effort to break up a public education system that he has called “a government-run monopoly.”

Popular ride-hailing companies Uber and Lyft will plead their case Thursday before the Maryland Public Service Commission that they should not be required to fingerprint drivers.

Fingerprinting is a standard part of the background check process for taxicab drivers and many other professionals licensed by the state. But Uber and Lyft argue fingerprint-based background checks are less accurate than their own private systems and discriminate against minorities who are more likely to be in the criminal record system following an arrest, even if never convicted.

Under a state law passed in 2015, the companies are required to begin background checking drivers Dec. 15 using the fingerprint database maintained by the state and the FBI, unless they prove their approach is equally effective. Both companies filed separate petitions with the state Public Service Commission, which regulates ridesharing companies, for permission to continue doing background checks their way.

Uber has said it will pull out of Maryland if fingerprinting is enforced. Lyft has not said it would withdraw, but pointed out that it does not operate in any market where fingerprinting is required except New York City.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake reaffirmed Thursday that Baltimore welcomes immigrants and refugees, joining a growing number of mayors across the country who say they are trying to allay fear in those communities after the election of Donald J. Trump as president.

Baltimore's mayor said city police will not check the citizenship status of people with whom they interact. Her administration is publishing a community guide that urges immigrants in capital letters: "Do not panic." And city officials are working to steer immigrants toward legal and other resources offered by nonprofits.

Rawlings-Blake said Trump's election creates "a very scary environment for new Americans.

Senior Hamas official Mahmoudud Zahar has suggested that US President-elect Donald Trump is secretly a Jew.

In an interview with Al-Jazeera earlier this month, translated by MEMRI,  Zahar said that "Trump loves the Jews, and not only because he likes the Jewish religion. I do not rule out the possibility that he is a Jew.

See full interview  Here
 

Baltimore is prepared for the upcoming snow season, city officials announced Monday.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said the city has a $6.3 million snow removal budget to go along with more than 300 essential personnel, 280 pieces of city and contractor equipment and 18,100 tons of salt.

"I hope I am not tempting fate by declaring that the city of Baltimore is fully prepared for the winter season ahead, since I have what, only a week and a half? I say that will be someone else's problem," Rawlings-Blake said.

Rawlings-Blake's last day on the job is Dec. 6. Her remarks about tempting fate relate back to her very first days on the job in February 2010, at the helm when snomaggeden dumped 45 inches of snow on Baltimore.

BALTIMORE - Baltimore City is offering free and reduced parking this holiday season.

Parking meters in all nine Main Streets will offer two-hour free parking from Friday, November 25 to Sunday, November 27.

Those streets are: Belair-Edison Main Street, East Monument Street Main Street, Federal Hill Main Street, Fell's Point Main Street, Hamilton-Lauraville Main Street, Highlandtown Main Street, Pennysylvania Avenue Main Street, Pigtown Main Street, Waverly Main Street.

In addition, Caroline Street Garage in Fells Point and Eden & Fleet Garage will offer $1 flat discounted rate from 5 P.M. on weeknights and all day on weekends startiung November 28 through December 24.

Sabra Dipping Co. is recalling some hummus products and spreads because of possible Listeria contamination, the US Food and Drug Administration said Saturday.

The products were manufactured before November 8 at a plant where Listeria monocytogenes have been found, but the bacteria has not been found in products that have been tested, the FDA said. The products were distributed to retail outlets in the United States and Canada.

Consumers are urged to discard any product with a "Best Before" date through January 23, 2017. That date can be found on the lid of each package.

A list of the products recalled can be found on the FDA or Sabra websites.

The thought that Mitt Romney would ever join the cabinet of Donald Trump — given their fuming hostility, mutual contempt and venomous rhetorical exchanges — might be the most absurd notion yet of a crazy political year.

But the possibility that Trump and the man he labeled a “choke artist” could find common cause in the new administration was nonetheless a hot topic ahead of their meeting Saturday at the president-elect’s Bedminster, New Jersey, golf retreat.

The 2012 Republican nominee, who once warned in a CNN interview that a Trump presidency would mean “trickle down racism” and “trickle down bigotry,” instead sat down with Trump and discussed the job of secretary of state, an appointment that would make Hillary Clinton’s decision to serve in the same post under her 2008 primary rival Barack Obama seem routine by comparison.