Panel Members

ORLANDO, Fla. - NASA remains hobbled by the flawed leadership style and engineering practices that led to the Columbia disaster, according to members of an independent group that monitored the agency's safety efforts after the shuttle disintegrated during re-entry in 2003. Overall, the watchdog panel's final report yesterday found that NASA had made significant strides to correct the conditions that led to the deaths of the seven astronauts aboard Columbia. But seven of the group's 26 members delivered a separate assessment describing lingering problems in every aspect of NASA's efforts to return the space shuttle to flight.

A lawyer for Baltimore City says a task force appointed by the mayor to study the city's speed camera program did not hold an illegal closed-door meeting during a March visit to a contractor's headquarters. But a prominent member of the task force called the city's version of events "not true. " Assistant City Solicitor Hilary Ruley told state officials this week that a presentation to the task force was stopped once members realized the public had been barred from attending by Brekford Corp., the city's new camera vendor.

Baltimore County Council members on Monday delayed introducing a wide-ranging ethics bill proposed by County Executive Kevin Kamenetz, saying they didn't have time to review the lengthy legislation. Council members now plan to introduce the bill at a legislative session planned for Nov. 21, rather than Monday as scheduled. The measure could then be voted on in December. Among other things, the bill would add teeth to a county charter rule against council members holding state jobs; prohibit county employees from taking gifts from people who do business with the county; and require the financial disclosure forms of elected officials to be posted online beginning in May 2012.

President Barack Obama has named Gov. Martin O'Malley one of two co-chairmen of a panel of state and federal officials focused on defense and homeland security, the governor's office said Monday. The Maryland Democrat will co-chair the Council of Governors with Republican Gov. Terry Branstad of Iowa. The panel brings together 10 governors, the secretaries of defense and homeland security, the chief of the National Guard Bureau, the commandant of the Coast Guard, the commander of U.S. Northern Command and other key officials to discuss issues related to the National Guard, homeland security and defense support to civil authorities in the event of terrorism or natural disaster.

Community activists say they are concerned that an advisory panel that will help Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake select Baltimore's next police commissioner lacks representatives from city neighborhoods.  In an e-mail to Rawlings-Blake sent Monday, Cortly Witherspoon and Marvin "Doc" Cheatham, who lead civil rights groups, asked Rawlings-Blake to consider adding community members to the panel. The concerns are also shared by members of the Police Community Relations councils, which hold monthly neighborhood meetings at each of the nine police districts.

Baltimore's Urban Design and Architecture Review panel approved Thursday the master plan for a nearly 3 million-square-foot development at Harbor Point, between Harbor East and Fells Point, where Exelon's new headquarters is expected to be built. The removal of a proposed building and an accompanying playing field for U.S. Lacrosse was the most prominent change to the plan since it was first presented to the panel in early July. The national governing body for men's, women's and youth lacrosse decided to move to Baltimore County instead of to the city's waterfront, according to Harbor Point's developer.

Most members of a panel of land-use experts concluded last night that widening Route 32 in western Howard would spur development throughout the region. Their estimates on how much varied from no additional houses to as many as 7,300. State Highway Administration officials asked the nine-member group to determine the impact improvements to Route 32 would have on Howard, Frederick, Carroll and Montgomery counties. The highway agency is considering three options for the section between Route 108 and Interstate 70: widening it from two lanes to four lanes and putting in interchanges, adding interchanges only, or leaving the road as it is. County officials and some residents are worried about safety on the road, which has become more congested with population increases in the region.

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon has removed three officers from a tribunal panel at Guantanamo, another snag in a controversial justice system for trials of alleged terrorists. Retired Maj. Gen. John D. Altenburg Jr., head of the Pentagon's Office of Military Commissions, agreed with defense attorneys who said the two regular panel members and one alternate had conflicts of interest that called their objectivity into question. But Altenburg refused defense demands that he throw off two others, including the panel's judge-like presiding officer.

WASHINGTON - The independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks is refusing to accept strict conditions set by the White House for the panel's interviews with President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, and is renewing its request for Bush's national security adviser to testify in public, commission members said. The panel members, interviewed after a private meeting yesterday, said the commission had decided for now to reject a White House request that the interview with Bush be limited to one hour, with the questioners limited to the panel's chairman and vice chairman.

Managers of Baltimore's Lyric Opera House plan to begin construction this summer on a multimillion-dollar expansion and modernization of its backstage area - part of an effort to make the 1894 theater more capable of accommodating elaborate, large-scale productions. Architect Jonathan Fishman of RCG Inc. presented revised plans for the project Thursday to the city's Urban Design and Architectural Review Panel. The latest design is a scaled-back version of previous plans. Sandy Richmond, executive director of the nonprofit Lyric Foundation that owns the building, said he did not have a cost estimate for the latest design.

On Friday, Feb.15, the Baltimore City Democratic State Central Committee convened at the Oliver Community Center to select a candidate to assume the seat once held by Delegate Hattie Harrison, a longtime political stalwart in East Baltimore ("Community leader picked to replace delegate," Feb. 19). Ten candidates interviewed for the position, and three of the candidates were also members of the committee conducting the interviews. The oddity was that at no time did the chair or committee members think it was inappropriate for them to participate in deciding who should succeed Delegate Harrison.

Baltimore's Urban Design and Architecture Review panel approved Thursday the master plan for a nearly 3 million-square-foot development at Harbor Point, between Harbor East and Fells Point, where Exelon's new headquarters is expected to be built. The removal of a proposed building and an accompanying playing field for U.S. Lacrosse was the most prominent change to the plan since it was first presented to the panel in early July. The national governing body for men's, women's and youth lacrosse decided to move to Baltimore County instead of to the city's waterfront, according to Harbor Point's developer.

Key senators on the committee that handles casino-related matters rejected the notion of taking up the issue of Internet gambling during next week's special session, saying there isn't enough time to weigh the implications of a step that could, in effect, put slot machines in Maryland homes. Four Democratic members of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, each a supporter of other forms of gambling expansion, said Friday that they are not prepared to sort through the complex issues surrounding online gambling in a session that is expected to last less than a week.

Community activists say they are concerned that an advisory panel that will help Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake select Baltimore's next police commissioner lacks representatives from city neighborhoods.  In an e-mail to Rawlings-Blake sent Monday, Cortly Witherspoon and Marvin "Doc" Cheatham, who lead civil rights groups, asked Rawlings-Blake to consider adding community members to the panel. The concerns are also shared by members of the Police Community Relations councils, which hold monthly neighborhood meetings at each of the nine police districts.

Baltimore County Council members on Monday delayed introducing a wide-ranging ethics bill proposed by County Executive Kevin Kamenetz, saying they didn't have time to review the lengthy legislation. Council members now plan to introduce the bill at a legislative session planned for Nov. 21, rather than Monday as scheduled. The measure could then be voted on in December. Among other things, the bill would add teeth to a county charter rule against council members holding state jobs; prohibit county employees from taking gifts from people who do business with the county; and require the financial disclosure forms of elected officials to be posted online beginning in May 2012.

Managers of Baltimore's Lyric Opera House plan to begin construction this summer on a multimillion-dollar expansion and modernization of its backstage area - part of an effort to make the 1894 theater more capable of accommodating elaborate, large-scale productions. Architect Jonathan Fishman of RCG Inc. presented revised plans for the project Thursday to the city's Urban Design and Architectural Review Panel. The latest design is a scaled-back version of previous plans. Sandy Richmond, executive director of the nonprofit Lyric Foundation that owns the building, said he did not have a cost estimate for the latest design.

IT IS TIME for members of the state task force on casinos to take a forthright stand firmly against this insidious form of gambling. No mincing of words, no hedging: Maryland and casinos won't mesh.Only by staking out such an unyielding stance can panel members put an end to this matter. Otherwise, casino companies will dip into their deep pockets to buy their way into Maryland. They have already started to do so in Cambridge, where the town's attorney is now on the payroll of a casino, and in Annapolis, where a slew of well-connected lobbyists are earning huge sums to capture the allegiance of state officials.

Imagine this assignment: Find a way to raise $11 billion by 2010. That's the chore assigned to a 15-member Chesapeake Bay watershed finance panel appointed yesterday by the Chesapeake Executive Council. The group must come up with recommendations for financing bay restoration efforts by 2010 because state and federal officials have set that year for meeting bay cleanup targets. Their recommendations are due by the end of the year. Panel members include a former interior secretary, a former governor, financial and economic experts, and officials with experience in agriculture, air quality and funding for wastewater treatment plants.

With Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon maintaining a public hands-off stance for now, some are waiting to see how she handles assault charges that have been filed by two city officials who previously were romantically involved. Beyond reiterating Wednesday that she has "a no-tolerance level for domestic violence," Dixon declined to comment further on the accusations that Elizabeth C. Smith, a liquor board commissioner, and Demaune Millard, her chief of staff, have made against each other. "This is a private matter - I want to give them that privacy to move through that process as we move forward," Dixon said.

The proposed design for a redeveloped Morris A. Mechanic Theatre in downtown Baltimore includes an inviting outdoor plaza and preserves much of the shuttered theater's architectural significance, but it falls short in its concept for a new 32-story hotel and residential tower, members of a city design panel said yesterday. Members of the Urban Design and Architecture Review Panel weighed in on the design proposed by Washington architect Shalom Baranes for redevelopment of the theater at Baltimore and Charles streets, built in 1967 as the centerpiece of one of downtown's earliest urban renewal efforts.