New Proposal

RYE BROOK, N.Y. -- The Major League Baseball Players Association will make one last attempt to dissuade ownership from implementing a salary cap. But the contract proposal that the union will place on the table when negotiations resume today is not expected to produce a breakthrough in the protracted labor dispute.The list of union givebacks does not include a salary cap or the kind of severe taxation plan that would have a direct impact on payrolls, so the owners are expected to go through with their plan to declare an impasse next week and impose a modified version of their original salary cap proposal.

Decades ago, developer James W. Rouse looked at a rundown industrial waterfront in downtown Baltimore and saw the makings of an attraction called Harborplace at the Inner Harbor. Now a former Rouse employee looks at an expanse of woods in downtown Columbia and sees the possibility of an "Inner Arbor. " That's the name Michael McCall has given his proposal to turn 34 acres of woods surrounding Merriweather Post Pavilion into a place meant to celebrate both the arts and nature, a combination performing arts center, sculpture garden and elevated arboreal walkway.

THE ISSUE: Anne Arundel County delegates on Friday backed a new proposal for selecting county school board members. Instead of asking voters to pick from among the current system and two alternatives, the new proposal would have a county commission nominate board members as seats become vacant starting in 2006. The governor would appoint the members, who would run unopposed in the next general election. Currently, a nominating convention forwards the names of school board candidates to the governor, who makes the final picks but is not compelled to choose from the convention's selections.

The landscape of Howard County's "rural west" - the chunk of the county roughly west of Route 108 and Centennial Lane - is set for the moment, and most owners hold the right to develop their land, or not, as they wish. This could change, though, depending on the outcome of discussions that have been going on behind the scenes in county government. The debate could emerge at the County Council on Monday, as the panel takes up its disagreement with County Executive Ken Ulman's administration regarding development rights in that area, 94,201 acres that make up nearly 60 percent of all the county's land.

Despite a scaled-back proposal to expand the First Baptist Church of Guilford, a group of nearby residents remains opposed to the project, saying last night that the church is still too large for a residential community.At a hearing before the Howard County Board of Appeals, residents objected to the latest plans calling for a 1,502-seat church in the 7400 block of Oakland Mills Road -- compared with the current seating capacity of 400."We could support a 1,000-seat church and a reduction to the structure," said Kari Ebeling, president of the Oak Ridge Homeowners Association.

Amid criticism that their rental property registration proposal would be an invasion of privacy and impossible to administer, three county councilmen withdrew the bill last night and substituted a more lenient proposal. The new proposal includes a grace period for compliance and sharply lower fines, and adds to the number of exempt properties. It will be reviewed by a yet-to-be-formed working group before an amended bill is submitted in January. The new proposal addresses concerns raised by the Greater Baltimore Board of Realtors and Maryland Multifamily Association.

To avoid leaving Maryland without a way to license and discipline doctors should key legislation fail, two lawmakers introduced bills yesterday that would transfer those powers to a state agency July 1. The move comes as legislators who want to reform the way doctors are disciplined are locked in a struggle with the medical lobby. They say few Maryland doctors are punished because the standard of proof is too high and the board that conducts reviews is dominated by physicians who may be reluctant to act against their colleagues.

Major-league owners delivered a new proposal to the players union yesterday that slightly decreased the annual amount they hope to redistribute through revenue sharing and increased their thresholds for a stiff luxury tax on the baseball's highest payrolls. The new proposal would drop management's proposed annual revenue transfer from $268 million to $263 million and raise the threshold for the luxury tax from $102 million to $107 million for the first three years of the four-year labor agreement and to $111 million for the final year.

RYE BROOK, N.Y. -- Baseball's labor summit concluded yesterday without significant progress, but there appears to be growing optimism that the rejuvenated negotiations will lead to a compromise.The three-day collective bargaining session at the Doral Arrowwood Conference Center produced a wide-ranging discussion of the economic issues that have polarized the bargaining units since the players went on strike Aug. 12. Little time was spent in actual negotiation, but the owners have agreed to bring a new proposal when bargaining resumes Thursday in Washington.

A new proposal for 25 large, detached homes in a retirement community to be built on 19 acres in Glenwood got enthusiastic approval last night from the Howard County Planning Board. "I love this plan. I hate townhouses in the west," said board member Joan Lancos, referring to an earlier proposal by developer Donald R. Reuwer Jr. to build 116 townhouses for seniors near Cattail Creek Country Club. "I really think it's a high-end retirement community," board member Gary Kaufman said about the 2,400- square-foot homes that would cost $400,000 to $500,000.

At Stoneleigh Elementary School south of Towson, classrooms are too crowded to hold all the students, so many classes are held in portable trailers parked outside. It's a common problem in Baltimore County's York Road corridor, where trailers are being used at eight of the 12 elementary schools from Stoneleigh to the Pennsylvania line. Now, county school officials are poised to offer some creative solutions — including moving Stoneleigh students more than a mile away to a school on the other side of Towson, and building a new school in Mays Chapel.

Anne Arundel County police have closed their investigation into a food contamination incident that closed the Fuddruckers restaurant in Annapolis for a day last week. After "numerous" interviews, county detectives found "nothing criminal" in the appearance of suspected rat poison on trays of hamburger stored in a walk-in refrigerator, said police spokesman Justin Mulcahy. The matter was handed back to the county health department. Health officials could offer no explanation as to how the poison came to be found on food trays, but suggested that employees, rather than a professional exterminator, were responsible.

As Baltimore school and teacher union officials prepare to return to the negotiating table next week, they said they don't expect to make significant changes to the tentative agreement that educators rejected Thursday and will concentrate instead on clearly explaining the terms of the innovative contract. Bargaining teams for the Baltimore Teachers Union and the school district said they are optimistic that they can reach an agreement that educators will approve. The contract, which was one of the most contentious to be introduced in the city, was rejected by 58 percent of the 2,600 union members who cast ballots this week.

Three weeks after a rejection from regulators, Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. is trying to revive a plan to roll out technology it says would save customers money by helping them control energy use. BGE said it filed an amended proposal Monday with the Maryland Public Service Commission to install "smart meter" technology, which would let consumers track their electricity use. The utility is still asking to pass startup and upgrade costs on...

Opponents of revitalization plans for West Baltimore's "Superblock" took their case to Maryland's highest court yesterday, arguing that a private group's plan to redevelop land near Howard and Lexington streets should be scrapped and the city should seek new proposals for the property. M. Albert Figinski, an attorney representing the opponents, told Maryland's Court of Appeals that the plans by Lexington Square Partnership, the Superblock's developer, are not consistent with the preservation objectives spelled out in a Memorandum of Agreement signed by city officials in 2001, when they received state funding to restore the Hippodrome Theatre.

In Annapolis, a city that values its history and guards its tradition, officials are taking a close look at lease proposals for the annual sail and power boat shows. These plans packed City Hall last week with maritime merchants and others in the industry who turned out mostly to ask why anyone wants to tinker with success. One proposal comes from Ed Hartman, the 81-year-old guru of the boat shows who has been running the City Dock bashes every October for three decades. He wants to add a fifth year to his current four-year lease that would stretch his reign to 2014, a deal he says offers stability for the fall events.

Last year, Congress saw little immediacy in addressing the Section 8 problem.Because the high-cost Section 8 contracts expiring in 1996 covered fewer than 1,000 units, it was easy to ignore the problem for another year. Actually, Congress didn't totally pass the buck: It renewed the high-cost subsidies only for one year, while it gave HUD authority to "demonstrate" the benefits of restructuring the program on 15,000 units. But this demonstration expires at the end of September 1997, and thus leaves more than 700,000 units awaiting action - 236,000 expiring in 1997.

AFTER 32 public hearings, you might think the last word had been uttered on the subject of Maple Lawn Farms, the mega-development slated for the Iager Farm in Fulton. You'd be wrong. If you're an opponent of the project, you'd like to think what we have is the first word. The first word on a whole new approach. If you want the project to proceed, then, yes, it could be the last word because the new proposal might look like a poison pill. Two members of the County Council, sitting as a zoning board, have proposed that no work be done on the big development until various road projects are completed.

After more than three years of deliberation - and sometimes acrimonious debate - Columbia's developer is preparing to submit rezoning plans for the town's center early next month, officially launching the far-reaching transformation envisioned for the planned community over the next three decades. Gregory F. Hamm, vice president of General Growth Properties, told about 300 people at a public meeting Wednesday night that the firm would submit its plans to the county "early in August." The plan, which will require approval by the county government, calls for five neighborhoods around the Mall in Columbia and Merriweather Post Pavilion comprising: * 1 million square feet of new retail space; * 4.9 million square feet of office space; * 5,500 new townhouses and apartments; * 640 more hotel rooms; * 265,000 square feet of "cultural space" The affordable housing component of the plan is not finalized, Hamm said.

MOSCOW -- Top Russian officials publicly rejected a new proposal personally presented by senior U.S. Cabinet secretaries, meant to convince Moscow to withdraw its objections to a missile defense system in Eastern Europe. Moscow's rebuff yesterday was made both in substance and tone, with President Vladimir V. Putin coming close to openly ridiculing the anti-missile system and the Russian foreign minister saying the U.S. had failed to make a case that Europe faces a long-range missile threat from Iran.