Baltimore ponders the ethics of saving parking spots as snow lingers; WYPR, February 3, 2026

Scott Maucione , WYPR; Baltimore ponders the ethics of saving parking spots as snow lingers

"During a snow storm, parking can verge on a moral crisis. What if the person taking a spot or reserving a spot has a broken leg or is eight and a half months pregnant, or just needs to make a quick trip to the store.

But much like the Wild West, it’s vigilante justice in the world of frozen city streets.

Emily Heleba waited all week to shovel her car out. Now half way through the job, she has no hopes she’ll actually be able to keep the spot.

“I've seen a lot of stories of people who do that, and then their neighbors come out and throw their chairs out and steal the spot anyway,” Heleba said.

So, until the snow melts, the parking wars will continue."

Eye in the sky: the billionaires funding a surveillance project above Baltimore; Guardian, 10/15/16

Tom Dart, Guardian; Eye in the sky: the billionaires funding a surveillance project above Baltimore:

"From January to August this year, Baltimore police said at a news conference last week, the plane flew over the city for 314 hours, taking more than a million images. The police added that the plane would operate as an anti-terrorism measure during Fleet Week, which started on Monday, and the marathon.

This spurt of transparency was more than a little tardy. Until Bloomberg Businessweek ran a story in August, virtually no one knew about the surveillance programme, not even the mayor. Yet the technology raises obvious civil liberties questions, as does the way the plan was funded: by unaccountable private citizens in Houston whose wealth silently enabled a blanket tracking tool in a large city with notoriously strained relations between police and residents."