Controversy

Carroll County school officials have discontinued use of a cafeteria checkout system with palm-scan technology after protests from parents who said the system violated their children's privacy. School Superintendent Stephen Guthrie announced his decision Wednesday to halt use of the system, called PalmSecure, and to ask officials to look at other options. His announcement came after a meeting with County Commissioner Doug Howard, who cited concerns among parents who worried about possible security breaches.

The Baseball Writers' Association of America released its Hall of Fame ballot today, and now the next six weeks will be filled with debate on whether some of the biggest names -- and most controversial characters -- will get into Cooperstown's hallowed halls. Players on the ballot for the first time include a few stars that were embroiled in the sport's steroid controversy: namely Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and former Orioles outfielder Sammy Sosa. Mike Piazza, Craig Biggio and Curt Schilling also are first-timers, joining popular holdovers such as Jeff Bagwell, Jack Morris and Tim Raines on the ballot.

Washington State is barely on anyone's radar when it comes to college football, so fans on the East Coast might not be following what has transpired in Mike Leach's first season in Pullman. It has a striking resemblance to Randy Edsall's first season in College Park.  After a 2-1 start - including a win over Football Championship Subdivision power Eastern Washington - the Cougars are in free fall, having lost their last seven games, and they've gone winless in the Pac-12 Conference.

In her first 100 days on the job, Howard County schools Superintendent Renee Foose has revamped the system's legal services, established an office of accountability and called for revision of a redistricting proposal to shift hundreds of students to new schools, a move that some parents have decried. Foose is steadily imposing her management approach on the 50,000-student system as she attempts to fulfill promises to make it more transparent and accessible - directives spelled out in the entry plan she unveiled as she took over July 1. Perhaps the most controversial move she has made involves the redistricting plan.

Baltimore city employees wasted nearly $1 million in recent years purchasing fuel at private gas stations instead of filling up at cheaper, government-owned pumps, the city's inspector general reported Tuesday. Inspector General David N. McClintock probed expenses under a contract with Wright Express Financial Services, which managed gasoline credit cards given to some city employees, partly for use while traveling, from 2007 to 2012. McClintock concluded that a small program initially intended for limited law enforcement purposes, such as letting sheriff's deputies transporting prisoners fill up on road trips, expanded greatly and led to questionable spending.

NEW YORK - It wasn't as crucial as the missed call that defined both the 1996 American League Championship Series and the uneven relationship between the mighty New York Yankees and the Orioles. It certainly wasn't as clear cut. Nevertheless, a 3-1 loss to the New York Yankees in Friday's Game 5 of the AL Division Series that ended the Orioles' wild ride of a season included another controversial call in right field at Yankee Stadium (though it is a new building). With two outs in the top of the sixth inning and the Orioles trailing the Yankees and their ace CC Sabathia 1-0, Nate McLouth hit a towering fly ball down the right field line.

For more that two decades, author Emily Bernard has been fascinated by Carl Van Vechten, a white man who played a seminal - and controversial - role in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s. She was in turns appalled by Vechten's air of entitlement, amused by some of his provocations and moved by his devotion to individual artists. (For instance, Van Vechten lobbied authorities to erect a nude, anatomically correct statue in New York's Central Park of the African-American activist James Weldon Johnson.

Maryland coach Randy Edsall says he wasn't talking about quarterback when he hinted at personnel changes after Saturday's win over Wake Forest. "There is no quarterback controversy," the coach told reporters Sunday. Edsall said after the game: "I don't want to mention anything right now until I have a chance to really evaluate the film, but I think there will be some things from a personnel standpoint that will be a little bit different as we go into next week on offense. " Edsall, who has talked about trying to find playing time for backup quarterback Devin Burns, clarified Sunday that his postgame comments were related to the tailback playing rotation - not to Burns.

Baltimore elected officials said Friday they were outraged by an inspector general's report that found the Mayor's Office of Information Technology and a former deputy mayor withheld information from and misled city officials about a controversial project to install nearly $675,000 in phone and computer equipment. "I am extremely concerned if it happens to be the case that the administration is engaged in misleading top city officials," said Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke. "If it proves to be the case, I will say that I am deeply concerned about this approach to government and to life.

The sorry tableau of two replacement referees standing side by side in the end zone making opposite calls on a controversial play at the end of ESPN's "Monday Night Football" led to the largest audience on record for the post-game SportsCenter show. That image of those two hopeless referees making the opposite call on a contested reception will long serve as the symbol of what has happened to the game in this labor dispute between the real referees and owners. But the ratings for the games, compromised as they might be by utterly inept officiating, just keep going up. Sunday's contest between the Ravens and the New England Patriots was seen by 21.3 million viewers.