The Cardinal Gibbons School—one of Baltimore’s oldest and most storied Catholic high schools—announced about an hour ago via its Facebook page that it will close its doors at the end of the current academic year. The move comes as the Archdiocese of Baltimore rolls out its plan to consolidate the city’s Catholic schools progams, which has suffered in recent years from dwindling enrollment and contributions.

The school, opened in 1962, occupies the same space as St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys, which dated back to 1886 and counted George Herman “Babe” Ruth among its alumni. The field where Ruth played high school baseball is used by Cardinal Gibbons athletes today. The school counts several other prominent players among its alumni, including 1970s NFL star Jean Fugett and NBA players  Quintin Dalley and Norman Black.

According to political magazine National Journal, Maryland’s U.S. senators are among the most liberal in the nation. Sen. Ben Cardin tied with four other senators for the number-one slot, while Sen. Barbara Mikulski landed at number eight. Only Rhode Island—which had both of its senators tied with Cardin in the number-one slot—had a more liberal senate duo. Maryland’s delegation to the House of Representatives ranked as the 6th most liberal in the country.

Depending on your political leanings, this will either come as an affirmation or a call to action in the coming elections. Check out the full rankings here.

[photo courtesy of the Women's Suburban Democratic Club of Montgomery County]

Perhaps you saw The Baltimore Sun this morning, with its lead story, “Ethics changes outlined for city.” Sun editors are probably hoping you stopped there, lest you read the sub-headline: “Rawlings-Blake says her bill will seek to heighte public trus’.” Now, I’m all for heighte-ing public trus’, I just wonder when the city with lengthe the schoo’ dayz?

All kidding aside, this is truly pathetic. The typos littering Sun stories in recent months have been one thing, but egregious mistakes such as these simply cannot be made on front-page headlines if a newspaper expects to be taken seriously. As a subscriber and diehard Sun booster—with many friends who work for the paper—it’s painful to point out errors like this, along with the general decline in the quality of our city’s newspaper of record.

But the pain is muted by anger: The Sun and its owners at The Tribune Company are largely to blame for the paper’s sorry state. Yes, the newspaper industry is suffering nationally, but the decision by management at The Sun and Tribune Company to respond by decimating the paper’s staff—including the virtual elimination of the copy editing department last April—are the direct cause of humiliating errors such as this one.

Management seems to have mistakenly calculated that it can keep the paper afloat by continually cutting back on writers and editors—the lifeblood of a newspaper—so long as it continues to crank out a product every day. If they continue to manage based on the that premise, the end is certainly nea

Click here to see our September cover story in The Sun’s sad descent.

Until I moved back to Baltimore in 2008, the idea of driving to work every day was entirely foreign to me. After growing up in Pikesville, I went to college in New York and lived in or around the city until we moved back here. I took the subway—and for the last two years there, when we lived in Jersey City, the commuter PATH train—to work every day. During that time, I would occasionally grumble about the crowded trains and platforms, the delays, and—particularly in cold weather—the walks to and from stations. But the commute never took more than 30 or 40 minutes and I grew to really value the time it afforded me to read, rest, or just take a few minutes to space out and contemplate things.

After moving to Baltimore, this turned out to be a major adjustment. I’d like to say the environment was at the top of the list of reasons I hated driving to work every day, but, truth be told, it’s near the bottom. For one thing, I hate having to deal with cars—they break down all the time, gas is expensive, you have to change the oil (apparently. I have yet to do this.) Also, my reading time has been drastically cut. My commute used to give me a solid hour a day of reading time. I used to get through a book every couple of weeks, read the paper more thoroughly, do the crossword—all of that is pretty much gone and I really miss it.

All of which explains why, when Baltimore city launched the Charm City Circulator last week, making it a lot more feasible for me to get to work using public transportation, I decided tyo give it a try. The Circulator consists of 21 electric-hybrid buses that, when the program is fully rolled out, will run on four routes through the downtown area—all for free! It’s an ambitious, green initiative aimed at increasing tourism and use of public transportation and I think it’s great. The orange line was the first to begin operation, on January 11th.

As it happens, the orange line solves the major problem keeping from using public transportation to get to work. I live in Mt Washington, about a mile from the light rail stop, but, until now, there was no easy way to get from the light rail stops downtown to my office in Harbor East. As it happens, the orange line runs right past the light rail’s convention center stop and to Harbor East, about a block from my office. I decided to give the commute a try.

One thing I didn’t realize was how accustomed I had become to having a car with me all the time. Every day since last Tuesday, I have thought about trying the commute, but inevitably there was some errand I needed to do before or after work or some meeting I needed to drive to that would make being without a car particularly inconvenient. Finally, this morning, I was ready to give it a try.

I decided to ease into the commute. Rather than walk or ride my bike to the light rail stop—it’s not that far, but there’s a brutal hill coming back—I would drive to the light rail stop and take public transport from there. I had a few things to take care of, so I didn’t get to the light rail station until almost 9 a.m. when, to my dismay, the light rail parking lot was completely full. An adjacent lot had metered parking and a two-hour limit, as did all the other parking in nearby Mt. Washington Village. I could have searched farther afield for parking, but at this point, I decided to abort this first attempt.

Next time, I will have an earlier start and hopefully, I can find a spot at the parking lot. If not, I can probably find a spot on the streets near Mt. Washington Village. And, if all else fails, I can bite the bullet and ride my bike from home (which means investing in a lock—suffice it to say, I am a novice rider at absolute best). I perish the thought of coming home after a long day and having to slog up Sulgrave Ave., past Mt. Washinigton Elementary, but Lord knows, other people work a lot harder to go green. I’ll report back on my efforts.

In the meantime, I’m curious of anyone else’s efforts to use public transportation—particularly the Circulator—to commute in Baltimore. Of course, the packed parking lot could mean than more people are commuting to work—I’ve never seen the lot full before—but it could also discourage potential commuters like me. I wonder if there is any thought to expanding the existing lots to encourage more commuters. If it’s possible, there ought to be.

According to sources at the courthouse, Mayor Sheila Dixon has agreed to resign from office.

Details have not been confirmed. This morning, the judge in the case had scheduled a hearing to consider a motion by Dixon’s lawyers to throw our her conviction based on juror misconduct and confusing instructions to the jury. But the hearing never happened, as Dixon’s lawyers, state prosecutors, and, at times, Dixon herself, huddled at the courthouse all morning and into the afternoon, reportedly discussing a plea agreement in which Dixon would plead guilty to perjury charges, resign from office and, potentially, save her $80,000 a year pension from the city.

City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is in line to succeed Dixon upon her resignation. How the transfer of power will affect the city, the region, and attitudes toward Dixon and Rawlings-Blake remains to be seen.

Leave your thoughts and stay tuned…

Mayor Sheila Dixon’s lawyers, state prosecutors, and, at times, Dixon herself, have been huddling at the courthouse in downtown Baltimore all morning and into this afternoon, reportedly discussing a plea agreement in which Dixon would plead guilty to perjury charges, resign from office and, potentially, save her $80,000 a year pension from the city.

In July, when I went to M&T Bank Stadium to watch European soccer titans Chelsea and AC Milan play an exhibition game (left), I was blown away.

I knew Baltimore a passionate base of soccer enthusiasts, built around local haunts like Slainte, but nothing prepared me for the pandumonium on display. For one thing, all 70,000 tickets, ranging from $35 to $175, were sold out. But more shocking was the enthusiasm of the attendees. More than half were wearing either blue Chelsea jerseys or the black and red gear of AC Milan and hundreds had their bodies and/or faces painted in their team colors. The cheering was intense and sustained throughout the match

I spoke to a few of the attendees and they seemed evenly split between Baltimore-born folks who either play or played soccer or otherwise developed a passion for it over the years, and immigrants or children of immigrants from all over the world, who now lived in Baltimore or D.C., and were jazzed at the rare opportunity to see a world-class match.

Since the event, universally judged to be a massive financial and promotional success, local leaders have stepped up efforts to create a permanent soccer presence in Baltimore. In October,  Mayor Sheila Dixon sent a letter to the Maryland Stadium Authority, asking the body to study the possibility of building a new soccer stadium downtown to lure Major Soccer League franchise D.C. United—which has been unsatisfied with current negotiationms for a new home close to D.C.—to Charm City.

In addition, Baltimore is one of five U.S. cities in the running to host the 2018/2022 World Cup. You can sign the petition to bring the Cup to Baltimore here. The petition page includes some interesting facts about the history of soccer in Baltimore, including the following:

The city of Baltimore has long loved the game of soccer.

It was home to NPSL charter team Baltimore Bays.  In 1973, a then-record crowd of 24,680 watched as the Bays were defeated 6-4 by the Brazilian National Team lead by a thirty-three year old named Edison Arantes do Nascimento, Pele.

According to a report in the Baltimore Evening Sun, “Pele was mobbed by fans at the end of the game and escaped to the locker room attired only in a pair of black bikini briefs.”

Currently, Baltimore is home to the Baltimore Blast of the NISL, Maryland Tigers of the PASL, Charm City FC of the NPSL and Crystal Palace Baltimore & Real Maryland Monarchs of the second division USL.

Our city’s embrace of soccer is not entirely surprise. Within driving distance of Washington D.C., Philadelphia, and New York, Baltimore is an ideal regional location to draw fans of the international sport from each of those urban hubs. And, it goes without saying, Baltimore is a great sports town. If we can endure another 100-loss season for the Orioles, we can certainly endure our share of scoreless 90-minute soccer matches.

(photo courtesy udothedishes.com) 

By Evan Serpick

So, the verdict is in. And now, observers are left to wonder what went on in the jury room over the seven days of deliberation. To quote Sun columnist and WYPR host Dan Rodricks, with whom I shared a courtroom bench on verdict day, “It would make a helluva movie.”

I have my own theory about the gist of the deliberations and why the 12 men and women of the jury made the decision they did. I think a lot of city residents might have arrived at a similar verdict.

It’s seems very likely to me that Mayor Dixon mis-used gift cards that she knew were intended to be given away to kids. In the case of the gift cards purchased by developer Patrick Turner, she specifically asked for them as giveaways and then used them for herself. Her contention that she thought the cards—which arrived in her office in an unmarked envelope days after she requested them—were an anonymous gift from developer/boyfriend Robert Lipscomb was far-fetched. Besides the timing of the request and the arrival of the gift cards, what kind of anonymous gift is a stack of $25 gift cards?

At the same time, I think the lengths to which Republican state prosecutor Robert Rohrbaugh has gone to take down the popular Democratic mayor are appalling, and I bet the jury did too. His investigation opened over four years ago, when the mayor was an outspoken city council president. After spending millions of dollars in taxpayer money on the investigation, Rohrbaugh came up with $500 in mis-spent gift cards. If he cares so much about “the children of Baltimore,” who he claims were victimized, he could have just given them a portion of the millions he’s spent to take down a mayor who is largely seen as an effective, proactive voice in city government.

No one wants to outright ignore wrongdoing, but I’m guessing that some jury members were trying to balance their sense of immediate justice with a sense of broader justice. I think most, if not all, understand that the mayor had done something wrong. But I’d bet that many were leery of removing from office the first African-American woman to sit in the mayor’s chair, particularly on charges that may seem like a petty or minor misapprpriation of funds.

After seven hard days of deliberations—the notes requesting smoke breaks might have set a record—the jury ultimately found an uneasy compromise. They convicted Mayor Dixon of one of the lesser charges she faced, acquited her of three others, and left one other undecided.

Mayor Dixon will likely have to step down in the coming days, but whether justice has been served remains a question for debate.

By Evan Serpick, from Courthouse East

As the twelve jurors filed into the courtroom to deliver their verdict just after noon today, they seemed shell shocked, uncomfortable smiles on many of their faces. Then they delivered the news the city has been waiting for:

Mayor Sheila Dixon was convicted of embezzlement for using about $530 in Best Buy and Target gift cards, bought by developer Patrick Turner and intended for “the children of Baltimore.” She was acquited of three other charges, including felony theft, the most serious charge,. The jury could not come to a verdict on another charge, that she embezzled gift cards intended for the city’s Holly Trolley tour.

As a result of the conviction, the mayor will presumably have to step down, and City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake will be sworn in as acting mayor. If Dixon appeals the conviction and is successful, her office will be restored. The sentence on the conviction will likely be a suspended sentence and restitution of funds.

Dixon displayed little emotion to the packed courthouse as the decision was read. While the heads of some of lawyers drooped at the conviction on count 4, the mayor’s head remained high.

The jury in is on Mayor Sheila Dixon’s corruption charges. Of the five charges the Mayor was facing, she has been acquitted of charges 1 and 3—which alleged theft of gift cards— and charge 7, which alleged misconduct in office. She was found guilty of charge 4, fraudulent misappropriation by a fiduciary, meaning that the jury believed she received gift cards in her official capacity as council president but then used them for herself. A mistrial was declared on the second charge of fraudulent misappropriation by a fiduciary, which concerned a separate gift card. A fuller description of all the charges can be found here.

More news and analysis of the verdict will follow shortly.