Fort Howard

The plans are as ambitious as the $100 million price tag would suggest: a sprawling retirement village for military veterans on the site of a former Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in eastern Baltimore County. With 1,300 residential units, Bayside at Fort Howard would be one of the largest continuing-care facilities for veterans in the country. But months before the original move-in date for the first residents, the project is in danger of falling apart. Crews recently stopped renovating the old brick hospital and long-shuttered military quarters on the North Point peninsula campus.

The cashier who said she was a holdup victim Saturday night at the Festival of Lights holiday display at Fort Howard was charged yesterday with conspiracy in the crime, in which her son also has been charged.The accusation against Karen Ballman, 42, of the first block of Floral Place in Middle River brought to four the number of people charged in the incident, which netted the robbers nearly $7,000.Arrested and charged Monday were Ballman's son, Thomas Allen Harvey, 24, also of the first block of Floral Place, and Kenneth Bowman, 22, who was picked up near his home in the 800 block of Wilson Point Road.

Workmen are putting in the last bulbs for the Fantasy of Lights, an animated display that will brighten the sky over Fort Howard Park beginning the night after Thanksgiving and continuing for 50 more nights through the holiday season.The spectacle, sponsored by the Baltimore County Department of Recreation and Parks, will include 14 large-scale exhibits and more than 90 smaller ones along a 25-minute drive-through at the county park, located at the end of North Point Road in Edgemere-Sparrows Point.

If you walk along the well-kept grounds of the old Fort Howard veterans hospital on North Point peninsula on a clear day, you can see the Bay Bridge near Annapolis in the distance 14 miles away. It's one of the striking sights at the southeastern tip of Baltimore County, where thousands of the Baltimore region's military veterans have received medical care at the Veterans Affairs Fort Howard Medical Center. The large brick and concrete hospital was once the busy centerpiece of the 95-acre expanse of lawn, tall, old trees and century-old officers' houses that dot land surrounded by the Patapsco River and Chesapeake Bay. "It's a gorgeous site," said historian Walter F. Mathers, 53, of Anne Arundel County -- a veteran who recently escorted a family to Fort Howard to watch the sunset over the water.

World War II veteran Philip J. Campagna couldn't help but become emotional when he talked yesterday about the closing of the veterans hospital at Fort Howard. "It breaks my heart to know that the hospital is being closed after 59 years," said Campagna, a Hamilton resident, leaning on his walker at the hospital grounds. "Absolutely every veteran I know wants to keep the hospital here, and they also want a new veterans home. We feel strongly about it." Yesterday was a bittersweet day for the crowd of 600 that gathered under tents for a patriotic ceremony billed as a celebration of Fort Howard's history and a tribute to its staff and volunteers.

World War II veteran Philip J. Campagna couldn't help but become emotional when he talked yesterday about the closing of the veterans hospital at Fort Howard. "It breaks my heart to know that the hospital is being closed after 59 years," said Campagna, a Hamilton resident, leaning on his walker at the hospital grounds. "Absolutely every veteran I know wants to keep the hospital here, and they also want a new veterans home. We feel strongly about it." Yesterday was a bittersweet day for the crowd of 600 that gathered under tents for a patriotic ceremony billed as a celebration of Fort Howard's history and a tribute to its staff and volunteers.

Walter Pasciak, 84, was so eager to move to a proposed $180 million waterfront retirement community for veterans in eastern Baltimore County that he paid $5,000 to be given "priority consideration" on the waiting list. "The location is great, and all the facilities would have been there," said Pasciak, a World War II veteran. Now he doesn't know whether he'll see the money again. On Thursday, the Department of Veterans Affairs terminated its contract with Federal Development LLC, a Washington-based company that had been selected to redevelop Fort Howard Hospital and other buildings at the one-time Army base on the North Point peninsula.

The wind-whipped rain carried Joseph Conway back in time as he stood among the crowd yesterday at Fort Howard VA Medical Center.The ex-Army paratrooper joined more than 75 veterans and federal workers in the rain to protest what most admit is a fait accompli -- the demolition of the historic hospital on the Chesapeake Bay, which would be decided on as early as next year. "They have their minds made up to tear the hospital down, but I've received good care here, and since I live in Baltimore, it's been convenient," said Conway, a hospital patient who was wounded three times while serving with the 173rd Airborne Brigade in Vietnam.

KEEPING the Fort Howard VA Medical Center open hasn't made sense for decades. It's a crumbling, 57-year-old giant of a hospital in need of $23 million in repairs. Even then, this hospital by the bay would hold just 85 veterans.It makes far more sense to consolidate medical services for veterans at more modern VA health centers. Indeed, shuttering Fort Howard over several years will save nearly $10 million a year that could be redirected into other medical programs for Maryland veterans.Only 73 hospital beds at Fort Howard are occupied; it used to contain 245. It is located so far away from population centers that no public transportation is available.

To assist a growing population of older military veterans, the state Board of Public Works could take the first step today toward building a multimillion-dollar veterans home on the sprawling grounds of Fort Howard Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Baltimore County.A Silver Spring consulting firm has submitted a bid of $57,909 for a 90-day feasibility study to explore constructing a second facility in Maryland to treat and care for ex-military personnel in a retirement setting.If approved, the retirement home would sit on a stunning site overlooking a river and the Chesapeake Bay -- a tree-shaded tract named in honor of a dashing hero of the Revolutionary War that includes a facility nearly shuttered because of shifting medical needs.