Squeaky wheel gets the grease

The principal replied to my email this morning. The paved walking path was finally salted today and most of the ice is gone.

Email to Freetown Elementary School concerning ice on a frequently used path

Good morning Principal Cox,

My name is Michael Schearer and my daughter Chloe is a student at Freetown Elementary School. We live in the Sun Valley neighborhood behind the school. As such, we often walk home on the paved path that runs from the school to Leonard Drive. Most or all of this path appears to be on property of the school (or the county generally).

Yesterday afternoon, I noticed that most of the path is covered in a thick sheet of ice. In many places, the ice is covered by blowing snow so that you aren't even aware that the ice is there. While we were walking home, one student slipped on the ice and fell. Fortunately, he did not appear to be injured.

Many students who live in Sun Valley (and elsewhere) use this path to walk to and from school. It concerns me that yesterday, more than two days after the end of the most recent snowstorm, this path appears to have been untouched by anyone at the school or the county. The fact that at least one child has already slipped and fallen on the ice is evidence to me that the path is not safe.

I would appreciate if you could bring this to the attention of the appropriate personnel at the school or Anne Arundel County, so that this path can be properly cleared for the safety of all of the students that use it (and the parents, too). And not just now, but for future weather events, too.

I have attached a few pictures that I took yesterday that show the extent of the ice on the path. These images are all in the area of the playground, right next to the school.

Thank you very much for your prompt attention to this matter.

Michael Schearer

Not in my backyard, Maryland edition

Heroin is certainly not unique to Maryland. But Baltimore is widely regarded as the "Heroin Capital" of the United States. Estimates from the federal government and the Baltimore Department of Health suggest that Baltimore is home to 48,000-60,000 addicts; or nearly a tenth of the city's population. And this epidemic has spilled into Baltimore's suburbs, too. Heroin's link to Baltimore also spawned a popular, but ultimately disturbing website that chronicles anecdotal evidence of heroin users in and around the city. When it comes to heroin, The Wire was not too far from the mark.

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan has highlighted the state's heroin epidemic several times since the election in November, and made it a priority in his state of the state address on Wednesday. Anne Arundel County Executive Steve Schuh has done the same.

The most effective treatment for heroin addiction is methadone. The staple of a heroin-addicted community is the methadone clinic. It should not be surprising, then, that fighting the heroin problem means putting these clinics in the communities where heroin is a problem.

Recent plans to open a methadone clinic on Hogs Neck Road in Pasadena in Anne Arundel County came to a screeching halt in the face of massive opposition from the community. Sadly, some went way too far in opposing the clinic by making death threats against the owner.

I suspect if you surveyed the people who oppose the clinic, many people would believe that the clinic's customers are from Baltimore City or somewhere else, and that the clinic is bringing drug addicts into their neighborhoods. But in reality, the addicts already live in those neighborhoods. The heroin problem will not go away because communities oppose methadone clinics in their neighborhoods. But the heroin addicts who live in those neighborhoods will have to go father to get treatment. Behind the facade, our otherwise-picturesque communities are dotted with halfway houses, group homes, parolees, probationers, and sex offenders. We cannot ignore the problem by pretending it doesn't exist in our supposedly-idyllic neighborhoods. It's here and we need to confront it.

A rough day is all a matter of perspective

For me, a rough day is getting up at 4:30AM and not getting back home until after 10:00PM. Sometimes, though, a rough day is all a matter of perspective. This woman was passed out drunk on the light rail with a beer can in her purse. When she got kicked off the light rail, she dropped a citation for disorderly conduct ($500 or 90 days in jail) for sleeping at BWI Airport. I don't know her story beyond that, but I'd say she's had a rough day.

Parking lot at the North Linthicum Light Rail Station, part three

I'm not sure if these are new, or if I am just noticing them now. But there are now two solar-powered security cameras installed on the light poles in the parking lot of the North Linthicum Light Rail Station. There was a truck there this afternoon which appeared to be installing one of them, but I'm not certain that they weren't just doing maintenance on them.

Hopefully someone is watching them. If so, surely they would have noticed the flash of my camera. :-)

My previous posts about the North Linthicum Light Rail Station are here and here.

Marley history mystery

Our neighborhood is saturated with references to Marley: the Marley Station Mall (quite obviously named after the train stop pictured below), Marley Elementary and Marley Middle School, Marley Creek, Marley Station Road, Marley Neck Boulevard, and Marley Neck Road, to name just a few.

Here's the Marley Station stop on the Baltimore and Annapolis Railroad, circa 1944:

The earliest reference I can find to anything Marley is Marley Chapel. Here's the historical marker:

On the other hand, this marker doesn't tell us anything about who the chapel was named after. Although because of its 1731 date, we can safely exclude Jacob Marley, Bob Marley and a yellow labrador retriever named after the latter.

Google is surprisingly unhelpful, even when filtering out Bob, Ziggy, and Jacob.

The founders of Anne Arundel and Howard Counties, Maryland: A genealogical and biographical review from wills, deeds and church records references Marley Chapel on page 203, but doesn't otherwise have any evidence to suggest who Marley might have been. Similarly, A History of Anne Arundel County in Maryland doesn't provide any clues.

So...who was Marley?

Parking lot at the North Linthicum Light Rail Station, redux

Shortly after I made this post, the Maryland Department of Transportation visited my blog. I assume that is just a coincidence. Since then, I have seen an increase in police presence in the parking lots at night. Also probably a coincidence. But a good development, nonetheless.

On a related point, I've also seen an increase in fare enforcement on the Light Rail. On the other hand, my 8 rides a week are a small sample.

If you have to explain that you're not racist...

This is the parking lot at the North Linthicum Light Rail Station

The lights are right down the middle of the parking lot. There are actually rows of parking on either side of the lights, but you wouldn't be able to tell from this photograph. I'm standing about ten feet from the left edge of the parking lot; again, you wouldn't be able to tell because it's so poorly lit.

Police shut down an underage drinking party, but what about the Fourth Amendment?

Police in Anne Arundel County shut down an underage drinking party and cited 22 juveniles between the ages of 14 and 17. Aside from the important issue of underage drinking, let's take a look at this incident from a Fourth Amendment perspective.

Consider the following police report (emphasis is mine):

On March 23, 2013, at approximately 9:00 p.m., officers were dispatched to a residence in the 100 block of Southway Drive in Severna Park for a report of an underage drinking party.  This was the third such call in four months at this address. 

As the first officer arrived, the officer observed juveniles walking out of the residence with cans of beer in their hands. The officer subsequently entered the open door and found the home full of juveniles consuming alcohol. Several subjects fled from the home before additional officers arrived, but officers were able to detain 22 individuals in the residence. One of the juveniles fell out of a second story window as he attempted to avoid detection by the officers, yet he was uninjured and brought in with the rest of the subjects. All of the individuals were under the legal drinking age and in the possession of alcohol. The adult homeowner was not at home. 

 In total, 22 juveniles, males and females between the ages of 14 and 17, were charged via citation with underage liquor law violations. Due to their various states of intoxication, the juveniles were all detained at the residence until officers were able to contact their parents who responded to take custody of their children.

Probable cause here is simple: The police had received three calls in four months at this address; the the officer observed juveniles walking out of the residence with cans of beer in their hands. Police could have obtained a search warrant; However, there is no evidence that they did.

The police presumably entered the private residence without a warrant. Warrantless searches are presumed to be unconstitutional. As a result, to be a valid search, the police must point to a warrant exception. Probably the most likely exception here is plain view, because the officer, while standing outside the home, observed juveniles walking out of the residence with cans of beer in their hands. On the other hand, the officer found the home full of juveniles consuming alcohol after he entered the open door. Plain view permits the seizure of evidence if police are lawfully in the location from which the evidence can be viewed.

Other warrant exceptions (search incident to lawful arrest, consent, stop and frisk, automobile exception, emergencies or hot pursuit) probably don't apply. One might try to make a case that underage drinking was an emergency, but absent any view of someone passed out or in otherwise immediate need of medical attention (as viewed from outside the home), this probably doesn't add up.

As for standing, unless one of the juveniles actually lived at the home, none of them could likely challenge the search because they don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy in that home as temporary social guest. Only the homeowner could do that. It would be interesting to see a challenge here, but I think it's unlikely that would happen. It is an interesting fact pattern, nonetheless.

If you want to restore and protect the Fourth Amendment, you have to be able to look past criminality. You have to be able to say that even though police thwarted underage drinking, that end result is worth challenging if it violates a basic principle of the Bill of Rights. Challenging questionable police conduct doesn't mean I condone underage drinking. But the Fourth Amendment (and the Bill of Rights in general) is more important than a house party.

What do you think?

The Shipwreck Burger, Before & After

Angus Burger with Grilled Cheese & Bacon Sandwich “Bun”, Spiced Rum Barbecue Sauce, Tempura Onion Rings, Fried Egg, Lettuce & Tomato. On the menu at Mutiny Pirate Bar and Island Grill.

Before:

After:

Graffiti cleaned up? I'm slightly surprised

The graffiti I talked about in this post has now been cleaned up. Here's the before:

And here's the after:

Of course, the building is still vacant, so there's that.

New graffiti on an abandoned bank buillding

This showed up on an abandoned bank building nearby. It happened within the past few weeks along with the (at least, anecdotal) rise in violence in the area.

There's another building at the far right of the second photo that also has similar graffiti from the same time period.

"King Square" is an apartment complex in Prince George's County. There is some possible evidence of gang activity in that area, but I simply do not know enough about it to say whether or not this is connected to that.

I have no idea if "Brookyln Pink House" is a reference to this, or to something in northern Anne Arundel County and Baltimore City (the neighborhoods of Brooklyn Park, and Brooklyn, respectively).

Crime reporting: Glen Burnie and Pasadena

I had, for a time, blogged quite a bit about much the violence here in Maryland, specifically in Baltimore and its immediate suburbs. I wanted to draw attention to the issue, and I think I began to accomplish that goal. A few problems soon emerged: the posts because repetitive, the geographic area was too broad, and (quite honestly) people stopped reading. In short, I went overboard. So I scaled back my efforts, hoping to just concentrate on Anne Arundel County. Since then, the posts on this topic in general have been few and far between.

So I've decided to take a different approach. Rather than blindly reporting and tracking incidents of crime, I'm thinking of focusing specifically on Glen Burnie (and to some extent, on Pasadena) and identifying themes that tie the posts together. For example, there seems to be some evidence of gang-related violence in the area as of late. So as I look into these issues, expect to see more content along these lines.

For general crime reports, I will probably just post links to stories on my Twitter account. Here's one example.

But I promise, I won't go overboard. :-)

Anne Arundel County and presidential elections

Anne Arundel County Presidential Election Results, 1998-2012

Year	Democrat	Percent	Republican	Percent	Margin
1988	55,440	35.7	98,540	63.5	+27.8R
1992*	68,629	37.0	81,467	44.0	+7.0R
1996**	72,147	42.2	83,574	48.9	+6.7R
2000	89,624	46.0	104,209	53.5	+7.5R
2004	103,324	43.6	133,231	56.2	+12.6R
2008	125,015	48.2	129,683	50.0	+1.8R
2012	116,065	48.3	118,319	49.2	+0.9R

*In 1992, Perot received 19.0% of the vote.
*In 1996, Perot received 8.4% of the vote.

As the chart above indicates, Anne Arundel County has voted for the Republican presidential candidate in every year since (at least) 1972 (summaries back to 1960 are available here). The margins have fluctuated, but until 2008 had been 7 points at a minimum in 1996 and as much as 28 points in 1988. Thus, even when Ross Perot was on the ballot, Republican candidates mantained a significant advantage in the county.

The last two presidential elections have seen a significant decrease in that margin: 1.8% in 2008 and just 0.9% in 2012. This year also marked the first time that (notwithstanding a strong third party candidate) the Republican candidate did not gain at least 50% of the county's voters.

Turnout in the county was down--69% across the county (which was the same turnout as statewide) compared to 79% in the county in 2008 (78% statewide).

UPDATE: The 69% turnout figure that I cited does *not* include absentee or provisional ballots. In 2008, Anne Arundel County had 17,540 absentee ballots and 3,942 accepted provisional ballots. These ballots represented 8.2% of the total turnout; turnout without them would have been 72.9% without them. Extrapolating similar absentee and provisional ballots for 2012, turnout projects to be about 75-76%.

Maryland smart meter opt-out bill gets unfavorable report in committee

So, HB 878, the smart meter opt-out bill that I testified in favor of, did not do so well when the House Economic Matters Committee voted:

I suspect that the committee was not so much voting against the opt-out provision, persuaded by the utility companies to defer to the Maryland Public Service Commission make the decision at their May 22nd hearing:

Either way, that's the next step. I don't know if I'll be able to make it to the hearing, but no doubt I'll be submitting my comments.

Maryland smart meter testimony (audio)

Here is the audio to my testimony this afternoon to the Maryland House of Delegates Economic Matters Committee on smart meter privacy. Yes, I know I talk too fast--this is a problem when you get three minutes and the delegates are impatient to get through the hearing. :-)

Testimony to the Maryland House Economic Matters Committee on HB 878 (3/15/2012)

Next week, I am scheduled to testify on behalf of HB 878, which would allow Maryland consumers to opt-out of smart meter installations. This is the statement I submitted. Your comments are welcome. Note that statements are generally limited to three minutes, so I had to keep it pretty short.

March 15, 2012
House Economic Matters Committee
Statement of Mr. Michael Schearer on behalf of HB 878

Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee,

My name is Michael Schearer and I am a Maryland homeowner, as well as the owner of a small business here in Maryland. For the past several years, I have been keenly interested in a number of matters involving privacy. I started a project called the Assault on Privacy which documents privacy abuses; and more recently I started a news aggregation website called Freedom Report which links to issues of freedom, liberty, and privacy both here in Maryland and across the nation. I appreciate the opportunity to offer testimony today regarding HB 878, and I want to thank Delegate Glass for sponsoring this bill. There are any number of concerns involving smart meters, but because of my background, I want to focus on the issue of privacy. I am here today on behalf of myself and my family, and thousands of other Marylanders who only seek a choice.

This spring, BGE plans to begin installation of “smart meters” in their customer area, and in Anne Arundel County in particular. I am here today because BGE expressly tells me that I am not permitted to opt-out of this device, and must accept its installation in order to have electric service in my home.

These sophisticated devices are called “smart meters” because they provide detailed and timely information about energy usage. The technology in today’s smart meters can provide in excess of 3,000 data points a month. This is a benefit for any number of reasons, but it’s also a cost for the very same reasons. “Smart meter” sounds like a nice thing, but let’s be clear—with this data in someone else’s hands, this is a surveillance device being installed at your home.

This data will provide unique identifiers and specific functionality of individual home appliances. Access to such data allows the reconstruction of one’s daily activities. Patterns of energy usage can be analyzed. You can determine sleep, work, or travel habits; these are highly personal routines.

There is a strong incentive for third parties to seek access to this data. According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, “[w]ithout strong protections, this information can and will be repurposed by interested [third] parties. It's not hard to imagine a divorce lawyer subpoenaing this information, an insurance company interpreting the data in a way that allows it to penalize customers, or criminals intercepting the information to plan a burglary. Marketing companies will also desperately want to access this data to get new intimate new insights into your family's day-to-day routine–not to mention the government, which wants to mine the data for law enforcement and other purposes.”

In fact, law enforcement agencies already rely on energy consumption data to gather evidence of possible crimes. In Kyllo v. United States, law enforcement used energy consumption data to develop probable cause that marijuana was being grown. Agents used a thermal imaging device to detect amounts of heat within the home. The Supreme Court reversed Mr. Kyllo’s conviction because, as Justice Scalia wrote, “[i]n the home…all details are intimate details, because the entire area is held safe from prying government eyes.” Lest you suspect this information would only protect criminals, in California, police raided a home suspected of growing marijuana because of their high energy usage—only the family wasn’t doing anything illegal.  Of course, BGE isn’t law enforcement, but without strong constitutional protections, is there any doubt that this data will easily find its way to any interested third parties?

The availability of this data to outsiders brings to light another particularly important issue called the third party doctrine. The Supreme Court has held that “[t]The Fourth Amendment does not prohibit the obtaining of information revealed to a third party and conveyed by him to Government authorities.”  In the recent case involving warrantless GPS tracking, Justice Sotomayor recently expressed concern about this very issue: “[m]ore fundamentally, it may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties.”

House Bill 878 simply gives customers a choice—the opportunity to say “no” if they have concerns about smart meters. This opportunity is not unique to Maryland. Last month, the California Public Utilities Commission gave PG&E customers the right to opt-out.  And barely two weeks ago, Nevada’s Public Utilities Commission did the same thing.  The people of Manchester, Vermont voted against smart meters at their Town Meeting last week.

Lastly, I would also suggest that the bill be amended such that opting out remains available at no cost to the customer. The smart meter program is being financed partially by “stimulus” dollars, and eventually by BGE customers through rate hikes; those that choose not to participate should not be penalized by unnecessary fees.

Sir Edward Coke wrote, “"[t]The house of every one is to him as his castle and fortress..."  The enormous amount of data that will be collected by smart meters has the potential to reveal the intimate activities inside our homes. Regardless of how it is collected, this information should receive the highest amount of Fourth Amendment protection. At least until that protection is ensured, and even afterwards, for privacy reasons, customers should be permitted to opt-out of smart meter programs. I strongly urge the members of this committee to pass this bill.

Mr. Chairman, thank you for the opportunity to speak to the committee on this important issue. I remain available for your questions.

63-year-old shot to death in Glen Burnie parking lot

From the Baltimore Sun:

A 63-year-old retired schoolteacher was found shot to death inside her car in the parking lot of a Glen Burnie shopping center Friday morning, Anne Arundel County police said.

Police were called around 11 a.m. Friday to a parking lot in the 7300 block of Ritchie Highway, where they found Myra Elizabeth Cason of Glen Burnie inside her Suzuki Sidekick with a gunshot wound to the chest.

Cason was last seen leaving Maryland Primary Care Physicians around 7:50 a.m. She was discovered later in the parking lot in front of a Pep Boys and a Gavigan's furniture store, police said.

She was pronounced dead at the scene and was taken to the medical examiner's office in Baltimore.

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Two hit-and-run fatalities in Anne Arundel County

From the Baltimore Sun:

Glen Burnie woman was killed by a hit-and-run driver Thursday night in the second such fatality in Anne Arundel County within 24 hours, according to police.
...
In the most recent incident, officers found the body of Dawn Lynn Gable, 43, of the 200 block of Cross Creek Drive lying in the area of Cross Creek and Highlander drives about 10:17 p.m., police said.

Gable had suffered massive trauma and was pronounced dead at the scene.

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Meanwhile, police reported that the vehicle involved in the earlier death had been located and that a person was in custody.

Early Thursday morning. Richard Francis Oles, 77, of Pasadena was killed as he walked along Mountain Road in an incident they said was related to the overnight snowfall. Police said that the driver of the vehicle that hit him, described as a red Ford F350 pickup with a snow plow attachment, left the scene without stopping.

Lt. Michael Brothers of the county police said Friday afternoon that the vehicle had been located and that a "person of interest" was in custody. That investigation was continuing.