Deadlock

A Republican proposal for another two-week extension of the federal budget, floated on Friday, at least delays the prospect of a government shutdown. But it does nothing to resolve the underlying stalemate between President Barack Obama and House Republicans over their effort to cut $61 billion from the current year's budget. What makes matters worse is that even if the Republicans succeed in enacting all those cuts, it won't come close to eliminating the budget deficit, which for fiscal 2011 is estimated at $1.5 trillion.

Jurors weighing charges against three men accused of killing former City Councilman Kenneth N. Harris told the judge overseeing the case Wednesday that they could not reach agreement on the most serious charges of murder, but were instructed to try again. The jurors told retired Baltimore Circuit Judge David Ross that they had been unable to arrive at a consensus on charges of first- and second-degree murder against Gary Collins, 22, Jerome Williams, 17, and Charles McGaney, 22. The three face counts on more than two dozen crimes connected to the Sept.

Baltimore County's school board named new leaders Tuesday night after a deadlock vote for the vice presidency and a closed-door meeting. Earnest Hines, who was on vacation and had written a letter to the board expressing his interest in becoming president, was unanimously elected to that position. Two members, Meg O'Hare and Edward Parker, were both nominated for the vice presidency; O'Hare received four votes and Parker five votes. Seven votes were needed to win the seat. The 12-member board was down three members whose terms had expired and one member was on vacation.

For the first time since charter schools opened in Baltimore, officials are confronting the complex issue of whether those schools should lose their right to operate when they produce poor academic results. The city school board deadlocked this week over schools CEO Andrés Alonso's proposal to revoke the charter of Dr. Rayner Browne Academy, an elementary/middle school in West Baltimore with poor test results, in an unusually open and heated discussion in front of hundreds of charter school parents and teachers.

An 80-minute videotape viewed by jurors shortly before they adjourned for Thanksgiving provided the breakthrough that led to Mayor Sheila Dixon's conviction, one of the jurors said Tuesday. Before viewing the tape, which replayed testimony of developer Patrick Turner and other witnesses, three jurors refused to convict the mayor on any charges, according to a 23-year-old Highlandtown woman named Shawana, known during the trial as Juror No. 3. One of those jurors disputed others' recollections that Turner had said the gift cards he gave Dixon were intended for needy children.

A company that is planning a mixed-use development near Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport has floated the location as a possible venue for a slots casino if a nearby site at Arundel Mills mall falls through. Linthicum Heights-based Heffner & Weber has offered to sell a parcel of more than 50 acres of undeveloped land near the Baltimore-Washington Parkway and the airport to a slots developer, presumably Baltimore-based Cordish Cos., which is seeking a state license and county zoning for its project at the mall.

A company that is planning a mixed-use development near Baltimore- Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport has floated the location as a possible venue for a slots casino if a nearby site at Arundel Mills mall falls through. Linthicum Heights-based Heffner & Weber has offered to sell a parcel of more than 50 acres of undeveloped land near the Baltimore-Washington Parkway and the airport to a slots developer, presumably Baltimore-based Cordish Cos., which is seeking a state license and county zoning for its project at the mall.

The extended slump bedeviling home sellers appears to have dented prices in Baltimore's suburbs more than in the city itself. In half the suburban ZIP codes last year, average sale prices sank below 2005 levels. But prices in the city remained above 2005 levels in three-quarters of its neighborhoods, according to a Baltimore Sun analysis. Affordability is one likely factor. The average Baltimore home sold for just over $180,000 last year, while the average suburban home changed hands for about $345,000.

After three days of deliberations, a Baltimore jury deadlocked yesterday in the murder trial of a man prosecutors accused of doing what the criminal justice system failed to do: punish the murderer of his little brother. After retired Circuit Judge Thomas J.S. Waxter declared a mistrial, Assistant State's Attorney James Francomano said that he would retry Darnell Edmonds, 25, in the killing of Kenneth Worrell, 28, of the 800 block of Bethune Road in Cherry Hill. Worrell was found dead in that block with multiple gunshot wounds to his upper body in December 2006.