Former Maryland state lawmaker Neil Parrott joins Midday to discuss why he thinks 2024 is the year western Maryland votes him into U.S. Congress.

Delegate Parrott first represented District 2B, and then District 2A in the Maryland House of Delegates from 2011-2023. Before being elected to the General Assembly, he was a traffic engineer at the Maryland State Highway Administration.

The landscape in the 6th district has changed considerably since the last two times Parrott ran. His opponent in 2020 and 2022 was Representative David Trone, a wealthy, self-funded candidate.

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It’s another edition of the Midday Healthwatch, our monthly conversations about public health with Dr. Leana Wen.

On today's show, we talk about vaccines. How should you approach conversations with loved ones who are skeptical of vaccines? We address 10 common vaccine concerns and how to talk to friends or family who are fearful of inoculating themselves against disease.

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On Thursday, Transporation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced Maryland is to receive $60 million of emergency relief funds as a first tranche of support in the recovery and rebuilding process of the bridge. He joins the show to give updates on federal recovery efforts. 

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Today's guests will discuss the next phase of the recovery process following the collapse of the Francis Scott Key bridge. Baltimore City Councilman Zeke Cohen, who represents the city’s first district, which includes part of the Port of Baltimore and Baltimore County Councilman Todd Crandall, who represents Dundalk and the rest of District 7.

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How does public policy impact public health. We ask Dr. Keshia Pollack Porter, the Chair of the Dept. of Health Policy and Management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, the director of the “Health in All Policies Initiative."

She is a scholar in the field of health equity, and she is the first African American to be named as the chair of a department in the longer than 100 year history of the School of Public Health.

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Can the Orioles keep up the magic this year? It is Opening Day at Camden Yards. The O's come into the season with a winning record in spring training, and an abundance of new talent.

Kyle Goon, a sports columnist for our news partners the Baltimore Banner, joins us from Camden Yards.

Meanwhile, the Orioles have a new owner in David Rubenstein. Major League Baseball owners approved the sale yesterday.

(Photo by Keith Allison, Wikimedia)

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Hours before dawn on Tuesday morning, Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge suddenly vanished into the Patapsco River. While many questions remain about the disaster, it will be years before a new bridge is built to replace the wreckage, and many months before a new normal is established for the tens of thousands of people who traveled on the bridge every day.

Late Tuesday night, the U.S. Coast Guard announced it was suspending its search for the six people unaccounted for following the disaster.

Rear Adm. Shannon Gilreath said that based on the length of time since the bridge collapsed and the water temperatures, they don't believe that search teams are going to find any of these individuals still alive.

Today on Midday we will explore what happened, how this incident is affecting our communities and what must be done to move forward. Guests on this program include Captain Tulli Messer-Bookman, WYPR Announcer Jim Howard, Baltimore City Councilmember Phylicia Porter and Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott. 

(Photo from Baltimore City Fire Department Rescue 1 Team)

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In a special Midday evening broadcast, Tom recaps the events of the day in the search and rescue mission regarding the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse.

In the early hours Tuesday morning, a cargo ship leaving the port of Baltimore crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, wrapping the ship in a tangled mass of steel, and plunging most of the bridge structure into the Patapsco River within seconds.

In audio of a police scanner recorded minutes before the crash, we hear first responders rushing to evacuate workers from the bridge and to stop incoming traffic from the north and south.

As the search and rescue continues into the evening following the crash, we hear the latest updates from WYPR reporter Emily Hofstaedter, who is reporting from near where the bridge once stood.

We also hear from Morgan State University Dean Oscar Barton, Jr., who runs the Clarence M. Mitchell, Jr. School of Engineering.

And Ralph Siegel of Total Traffic and Weather Network about how people will get around the region for the foreseeable future.

(Photo courtesy: Baltimore City Fire Department Rescue 1 Team)

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A large search-and-rescue operation is underway following the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge Tuesday morning after a container ship crashed into a support pier.

The bridge, which links serves an important artery for the region, and is part of Interstate 695 which serves north-south traffic along the I-95 corridor.

WYPR News Director Matt Bush joins us to discuss the latest developments.

We also speak to Dr. Mehdi Shokouhian, a Morgan State Associate Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering, about the monitoring and maintenance of Maryland's transportation infrastructure, including the Key bridge.

John Olszewski, Baltimore County Executive, joins us to discuss the ramifications of the collapsed bridge, which spanned from Dundalk across to Baltimore County.

And then we talk to Dr. Vittoria DeLucia, a psychiatrist with Sheppard Pratt, about how to cope with traumatic events and manage the fears that may result.

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In today’s installment in our series of Conversations with the Candidates, we talk with State Senator Clarence Lam, a Democrat who is one of several members of the Maryland General Assembly running for U.S. Congress in the 3rd Congressional District. 

Senator Lam is in his second term representing District 12 in the state Senate. When he was first elected in 2019, the district included parts of Baltimore County and Howard County. After redistricting, he now represents Anne Arundel and Howard counties. He serves on the Finance Committee, and he chairs the Joint Committee on Fair Practices and State Personnel Oversight. He is also the Secretary of the Maryland Legislative Asian-American and Pacific Islander Caucus.

Prior to his election to the Senate, he served in the House of Delegates for one term.

In addition to his legislative work, Dr. Lam is the Director of the Preventive Medicine Residency Program and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Bloomberg School. He’s also the Medical Director for Occupational Health at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, where he continues to see patients every week, even when the General Assembly is in session.

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