Downtown

Haven't paid your city property taxes? Then you're on the city's list of owners whose properties could end up in tax sale this May, along with nearly 27,000 others who (as of last week) were behind on taxes, water bills or other city tabs. That's more than 10 percent of city properties, located in neighborhoods as varied as Poppleton and the Inner Harbor . If previous years are any judge, many owners will pay up quickly and avoid tax sale altogether. Here's an interactive map that shows where all the properties are. You can click on the dots for more details, including the address, who owns and how much the city says they owe. (Keep in mind that some may have paid already -- and at least one is an error .)

Baltimore police are reviewing surveillance tapes to identify what appears to be middle-school youngster who mobbed a 7-Eleven store Wednesday afternoon on Light Street near the Inner Harbor. About 35 to 40 youngsters converged on the store shortly after 1:30 p.m., attracted by a free "Slurpee" promotion, and reportedly stole candy and then became angry with the manager when he confronted him. Police said some youths hit him on the back and arms. Read story from today's paper describing the attack . Police released the offense report this morning in which the manager reported that after the kids left, he noticed an envelope containing daily receipts -- $6,600 in cash -- was missing from his pocket.

A 19-year-old student from Baltimore Polytechnic High School told police he was beaten by two separate groups of juveniles from a rival school in downtown Baltimore on Thursday afternoon, an attack that comes amid a pitched debate over downtown safety. According to police, the student was walking in the 200 block of W. Fayette St., a block north of the First Mariner Arena, before 4:20 p.m. when he said he was attacked from behind by an unknown male. Nine other juveniles joined in as he tried to defend himself, and his phone was taken during the attack, he told police.  Moments later, police say, an MTA bus stopped in the block and a juvenile male wearing a Digital Harbor High School shirt "forced open the door and got off the bus," followed by 19 other juveniles wearing Digital Harbor shirts, who again assaulted the victim, police said.  Anthony Guglielmi, a city police spokesman, said the victim told the police he was attacked because of a rivalry between the two schools.

Whether they live in Baltimore or its suburbs, whether they're here every day, once in a blue moon or never at all, everyone has an opinion, everyone has prejudices, everyone constructs their own reality about the city. For some, it's a dangerous urban "hell hole" with a deserving "Third World profile. " No talk-radio bigot used those cruel and racially charged terms. Two college professors, one from Johns Hopkins and one from Loyola, did - and in a 2008 essay that affirmed in a national publication what television viewers had seen for years in the prime-time entertainment that exploited Baltimore's complex human problems: poverty, ignorance, violent crime, drug addiction.

Annapolis police are looking for a man who pulled a 21-year-old woman into an alley in downtown Annapolis and sexually assaulted her early Saturday morning. About 1:30 a.m., the woman was walking alone in the 100 block of Duke of Gloucester St. near the heart of the downtown area when a man walking behind her grabbed her and dragged her into a nearby alley, according to police. The man threw the woman to the ground and sexually assaulted her, police said. The woman, who had been walking home from West Street, was eventually able to fight off the man, who then fled, police said.

As someone with a vested interest in the health and prosperity of downtown Baltimore and the west side of downtown in particular, I appreciate that Exelon Corp.is committed to maintaining Constellation Energy Group's employment presence in Baltimore, and perhaps even increasing it. I do hope Exelon will choose to keep its offices in the core business district of downtown where, as Kirby Fowler points out in his recent commentary ("Exelon's place downtown,"...

Downton Towson has had trouble keeping retail in recent years, but a new tenant is giving hope of a shopping resurgence. Trendy clothing and knick knack store Urban Outfitters is moving to York Road in the old space once occupied by Hudson Trail Outfitters. The store is slated to open in time for the holiday shopping season. It will be the second store in the area. There is also a location in Baltimore's Inner Harbor.  Headquartered in Philadelphia, Urban Outfitters targets “urban-minded" young people - aged 18 to 30-years-old.  The retailer is known for its "kitschy tee-shirts and accessories.” Urban Outfitters will spend $2 million to renovate the building in Towson.   “We expect its arrival to this location to elicit an extremely positive and profound effect, as complementary retail uses will want to take advantage of its widespread popularity and destination-store appeal," said Ryan Wilner, a principal with KLNB Retail, which brokered the deal.

D owntown Baltimore has entered the new decade from a remarkable position of strength, in spite of the recessionary drag on the economy in 2009. Approximately 113,000 people work in downtown Baltimore, 16th in the country for job density. Downtown's primacy as a business center was further solidified by the recent decision of the accounting firm RSM McGladrey to relocate 300 employees to the city from the suburbs. Downtown's residential population of more than 40,000 ranks us seventh in the country, ahead of other dynamic downtowns in Atlanta, Boston, Denver, Portland and Washington, D.C. And there were more than $4 billion worth of downtown projects under way in 2009.

A security guard working an overnight shift at the Bank of America building in downtown Baltimore was shot and killed early Saturday when police said he tried to quell a dispute over a woman that erupted between a friend and several other men who had just left a nightclub. Police identified the guard as James Ball, 38. He had worked for Wackenhut, a private security company hired by the building's owners. He died at Maryland Shock Trauma Center shortly after being shot twice, at least once in the chest, according to police.

Baltimore police called in extra officers and arrested at least 10 juveniles Saturday night as a crowd that witnesses described as rowdy and numbering in the hundreds walked around Downtown. The arrests ranged from curfew violations to disorderly conduct and assault, said Detective Donny Moses, a police spokesman. The youth massed on downtown streets, from 1st Mariner Arena on the west side to "The Block" on East Baltimore Street, and south through Baltimore's Inner Harbor, Moses said.

A crowd of "unruly" school kids rushed into a downtown 7-Eleven store about 2 p.m. Wednesday for a free "Slurpee" promotion, and didn't leave until they'd caused a commotion — allegedly shoplifting and getting into a physical altercation with the store owner. According to police, between 20 and 30 middle school students rushed into the store near the intersection of Light and East Pratt streets all at once for the special promotion of the frozen drinks, called "SlurpFREE Day. " The company said the event was to promote its new sugar-free version of the drink, and to "launch the upcoming Slurpee season.

Annapolis police are looking for a man who pulled a 21-year-old woman into an alley in downtown Annapolis and sexually assaulted her early Saturday morning. About 1:30 a.m., the woman was walking alone in the 100 block of Duke of Gloucester St. near the heart of the downtown area when a man walking behind her grabbed her and dragged her into a nearby alley, according to police. The man threw the woman to the ground and sexually assaulted her, police said. The woman, who had been walking home from West Street, was eventually able to fight off the man, who then fled, police said.

The ongoing debate over youth crime in downtown Baltimore has sparked a war of words over race — overshadowing a debate over the police response to disturbances and objections from city politicians who say the issue is vastly overblown. Since a state delegate introduced the term "black youth mobs" in reference to hundreds of teenagers mobbing downtown on St. Patrick's Day, discussions from living rooms to online forums have been dominated by race. That has left little room for discussion of the real issues, all sides agree.

State Del. Pat McDonough told the Sun last week that he wasn't going to back down from claims made in a press release that 'black youth mobs terrorize" downtown Baltimore. And in his Saturday night radio show on WCBM (AM-680), he not only made good on that pledge, he ratcheted up the rhetoric ripping Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake while vowing to bring the issue of downtown public safety to the front burner of public consciousness with a "news conference" Tuesday -- and other actions to follow.

The under-reporting of disturbances and violent crime at the Inner Harbor is legendary ("TheSt. Patrick's Day brawl," May 16). I have been living downtown in the Central Business District for the past six years at one of the nightly hot spots - Saratoga Street and Guilford Avenue. This is the home of the infamous Club One (now a parking, lot after the liquor license was finally revoked after dozens of massive street fights and two shootings in the street), the recently closed Bourbon Street (after a number of fights and finally a massive four-person stabbing and their insurance being revoked)

During a stroll Thursday night from Little Italy to Harborplace, I bought jelly beans in The Best of Luck candy store, listened to a sidewalk trumpeter play the blues, noted several dead lights that left unappealing darkness along Pratt Street, and watched a Baltimore police officer train his flashlight into cars approaching the stop at Pratt and South, apparently looking for anyone not wearing a seat belt. He was the first cop I saw, and I guess his duty was in the cause of public safety, but I'd much rather have seen the man on foot patrol, strolling the sidewalks and Inner Harbor promenade with the rest of us. His presence certainly would have been appreciated 30 minutes later, when a squadron of eight skinny boys on bicycles decided to pop wheelies and fly along the brick walkway between the World Trade Center and the National Aquarium, oblivious (or maybe not)

Granted, the announced move of Constellation Energy/Exelon's new Baltimore headquarters around the Inner Harbor's northeast corner is not a quantum jump. Constellation's present location at 750 E.Pratt St. is already on the edge of downtown, furnishing walk-up patrons for restaurants in Little Italy and other eastern neighborhoods. The new HQ will be less than a mile away. But it will pull more energy from the downtown core and shift the balance of activity further eastward.

Baltimore firefighters were working to control a massive fire downtown on The Block, the city's main hub of strip clubs near City Hall. Thick, black smoke could be seen rising over the city as firetrucks raced down Interstate 83. Initial reports indicated that the fire was based at 404 E. Baltimore St., the location of the Gayety Show World.

A 19-year-old student from Baltimore Polytechnic High School told police he was beaten by two separate groups of juveniles from a rival school in downtown Baltimore on Thursday afternoon, an attack that comes amid a pitched debate over downtown safety. According to police, the student was walking in the 200 block of W. Fayette St., a block north of the First Mariner Arena, before 4:20 p.m. when he said he was attacked from behind by an unknown male. Nine other juveniles joined in as he tried to defend himself, and his phone was taken during the attack, he told police.  Moments later, police say, an MTA bus stopped in the block and a juvenile male wearing a Digital Harbor High School shirt "forced open the door and got off the bus," followed by 19 other juveniles wearing Digital Harbor shirts, who again assaulted the victim, police said.  Anthony Guglielmi, a city police spokesman, said the victim told the police he was attacked because of a rivalry between the two schools.

The master developer of Columbia's Town Center aims to begin construction by early next year on a $100 million apartment and retail complex, the area's first new housing in a decade. The Metropolitan Downtown Columbia will be a six-story, 380-unit development that the Howard Hughes Corp. plans to build in a joint venture with Kettler of McLean, Va., and Orchard Development of Ellicott City, on land next to The Mall in Columbia. Rents are expected to range from $1,600 a month for a one-bedroom apartment to $2,800 for a three-bedroom unit — making them among the highest in the region.