Questions mount for Maryland's next session
ANNAPOLIS — General Assembly leaders in Maryland ended the 2020 session early and recently declined a special session due to pandemic and presidential election concerns. But they have yet to announce plans, particularly regarding legislative voting, as the next session draws near.
“The reason we aren’t having a special session is because we need information,” Senate President Bill Ferguson, D-Baltimore, recently told demonstrators staging a mock General Assembly session outdoors while wearing masks and sitting six feet apart. “We need to do the work to make sure that when we convene as a General Assembly, we solve the problems that you care about.”
Ferguson and House Speaker Adrienne Jones, D-Baltimore County, further explained in a Sept. 17 letter to legislators concerns about acting “with imperfect information that will only be clear after the November 2020 Presidential election,” and stated convening an early session “would be a misstep and a disservice to the people of Maryland.”
In the letter, the legislative leaders articulated priorities such as police reform, long-term housing stability and improvements to working conditions, but stated the need for “greater clarity of federal support for state and local governments.”
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