NEWS
By Bradley Olson and Matthew Hay Brown | April 3, 2008
Gov. Martin O'Malley is working with state lawmakers to pass emergency legislation that would allow him to call a special general election to replace Rep. Albert R. Wynn, the Prince George's County Democrat who is leaving Congress in June to join a Washington lobbying firm. O'Malley wants to skip the special primary election now required under Maryland law and go straight to a general election to get the seat filled before Congress concludes its business for the year. With the 4th Congressional District leading the state in housing foreclosures, and service members from the region "coming back from Iraq in body bags," O'Malley said, constituents should not go unrepresented in Washington.
NEWS
By Brent Jones | December 20, 2007
The Maryland State Board of Elections is expected to reverse a recent policy change that would prevent 17-year-olds from voting in February's primary election. The attorney general's office released an opinion yesterday recommending that 17-year-olds be allowed to vote in the primary if they will be age 18 by the time of the general election. As a result, the board is likely to vote at its meeting today to allow those teens to participate in the election, a top state elections official said.
NEWS
October 30, 2007
Dixon keeps up brisk pace in campaign fundraising In the final weeks of a campaign that was hers to lose, Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon managed to collect nearly $330,000 in political donations - part of a fundraising effort that officials said will continue through her term. Dixon, who won the primary election in September with 63 percent of the vote, received nearly 700 donations between the end of August and mid-October, according to campaign finance reports released yesterday. "They mayor takes very seriously the fact that she does have a challenger in the general election and, of course, she will maintain a very active fundraising schedule through her term as mayor," spokesman Anthony McCarthy said.
NEWS
By a Sun reporter | October 30, 2007
A special election has been scheduled in Annapolis for the alderman's seat vacated by Michael Christman, Mayor Ellen O. Moyer said yesterday. The primary election in Ward 2 will be held Nov. 27, with the special general election Dec. 19. The winner will fill the final two years of Christman's term. The Republican, one of only two on the eight-member city council, was elected in 2005 but officially resigned last week, noting frequent travel for his job. His wife also recently accepted a job in Australia.
NEWS
By Sumathi Reddy and Laura McCandlish | September 13, 2007
Dreary weather and lackluster races were the quick excuses for the turnout in Tuesday's Democratic primary being the city's lowest in decades. But political observers say a more powerful explanation might be at work - the increasing ability of campaigns to identify their base voters and turn them out on Election Day. In municipal contests in Baltimore and across the country, campaign officials no longer troll through neighborhoods trying to drag every...
NEWS
By Lynn Anderson | September 9, 2007
Last year's primary election in Baltimore was marred by polling places that opened late and election judges who weren't familiar with new voting equipment. But state and city elections officials promise that this year's vote, on Tuesday, will be different. They met Wednesday to go over last-minute details and have shared information on election day do's and don'ts. The University of Baltimore's Schaefer Center for Public Policy is helping to recruit and train judges, and poll workers should be accustomed to touch-screen voting devices.
NEWS
By Paul Moore | October 15, 2006
With less than four weeks to go before the general election, the debate over electronic voting and other problems in Maryland's 2006 electoral process has become as important as the political races themselves - and The Sun should continue to cover all aspects of this continuing story. As Maryland officials try to fix the technical and human problems that created havoc during the September primary election, the integrity of the election system hangs in the balance. Since the primary, a number of articles have documented how the new voter check-in process kept some voters waiting for hours.
NEWS
By Melissa Harris | October 4, 2006
After a daylong test of the state's retrofitted voter check-in computers, it remained unclear yesterday whether the $18 million system works well enough for the state's elections chief to deploy it in the November general election. The machines experienced 10 problems yesterday, including someone accidentally kicking out a power cord, as more than 7,000 votes were cast during a mock election at the BWI Airport Marriott. Three of the glitches were identical and isolated to one of the 13 machines.
NEWS
By Andrew A. Green | September 30, 2006
Baltimore election judges will get a boost in pay for the general election this year, a move backers say they hope will cut down on the widespread tardiness and absenteeism that added chaos to this month's primary. A bill increasing city election judge pay by $25 a day and $50 for chief judges - passed long before the primary problems - goes into effect tomorrow, along with dozens of other measures, including stiffer penalties for teenage drunken drivers. City election officials say recruiting enough qualified election judges in the city - especially enough Republicans - is a chronic problem exacerbated by the long hours workers must put in at the polls and the low pay. Now, city election judges will make $150 and chief election judges $200 for a workday that can stretch beyond 14 hours.
NEWS
By C. Fraser Smith | September 24, 2006
Maryland's primary-election failures dampen what might have been a celebration of our system. To say the least. Every election has potential for exhilarating uplift. Challengers - such as Del. Peter Franchot, who won the Democratic primary for comptroller - took big risks and won. Voters did their part. They sorted through their many primary options and made their selections. Mr. Franchot's opponent in the general election, Anne M. McCarthy, took an even bigger gamble, dismissing the idea that a Republican can't win in Maryland, a state where Democrats have a 2-to-1 advantage in registered voters.