• Governing honors Baltimore Health Commissioner Leana Wen

    Governing Magazine recently published its list of Public Officials of the Year, which included Baltimore Health Commissioner, Dr. Leana Wen. From the publication, “Every year since 1994, Governing has honored individual state and local government officials for outstanding accomplishment by naming them Public Officials of the Year.” Wen, the profile noted, who took office only […]

  • Young adults at the YES Center

    Fellow-founded Youth Empowered Society featured in Baltimore Sun

    This week, the Baltimore Sun has a great feature on the Youth Empowered Society (YES Drop-In Center), an organization started by 2011 OSI-Baltimore Community Fellow Lara Law and currently led by Blair Franklin, a former program associate with OSI’s Community Fellowships & Initiatives. The article also quotes Terry Hickey, the director of the Mayor’s Office […]

  • Chris Christie testifies at opioid hearing in Baltimore

    This week, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee came to Johns Hopkins University to hold hearings on the opioid crisis at the behest of the committee’s ranking Democrat, Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings. The staff of OSI-Baltimore’s Drug Addiction Treatment program briefed Cummings’ staff in advance of the hearing. Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, chair […]

  • 2017 Community Fellows Featured on WYPR’s On the Record

    WYPR’s On the Record with Sheliah Kast continued the tradition of featuring the latest cohort of OSI Community Fellows. The first three 2017 Fellows were featured this week starting with Ryan Flanigan, whose project, the Remington Community Land Trust, aims to create affordable home-buying access for low-income residents. Listen here. Kim Loper started Youth in […]

  • OSI’s Education and Youth Development team participates in strategy meeting

    OSI Baltimore’s Education and Youth Development (EYD) team recently participated in Open Society Foundations National and Regional Education Strategy Meeting in Paris, France. The conference, which brought together national and regional foundations from all over the OSF network and grew out of a week-long course at Central European University (CEU) in Budapest on inclusion of […]

  • OSI Fellows, grantees to discuss creative solutions for sustainable change

    MICA’s Community Art and Service Program and the Philadelphia-based People’s Papers Co-OP initiative will co-present a community discussion “that brings together individuals from across the city who work to dismantle systems of oppression and narratives that feed into mass incarceration.” From the event page: “We’ll ask; How do artists, activists, and community members collaborate to identify […]

  • OSI’s Karen Webber talks to the Afro about Kirwan Report

    Last week, the Afro published a story about the Kirwan Commission’s decision to delay its much-anticipated report about equitable funding for Baltimore City schools, quoting Karen Webber, director of OSI-Baltimore’s Education and Youth Development program: “In Baltimore City particularly, we have a crisis in our murder rate right now. Students who live in neighborhoods where […]

  • WBAL-TV features OSI Fellow Matthew Burke and Baltimore Free Farm

    Earlier this week, WBAL-TV reported on the work of 2017 OSI-Baltimore Community Fellow Matthew Burke and his work with Baltimore Free Farm Food Rescue. As part of his project, Burke will expand and refine Baltimore Free Farm by establishing a network of 12 food give-away sites at local businesses, churches and community centers throughout the city […]

  • Tuesday: House Oversight Committee comes to Baltimore

    On Tuesday, November 28th, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will hold a rare field hearing at Johns Hopkins University to discuss the opioid epidemic. Maryland Representative Elijah Cummings, the committee’s ranking member, requested the meeting to examine the epidemic’s impact in Baltimore and the recommendations of President Trump’s Commission on Combating Drug […]

  • Justice Policy Institute celebrates 20 years, honors OSI Fellow and Grantee

    Last week, during its 20th anniversary celebration, OSI-Baltimore grantee Justice Policy Institute (JPI) honored Greg Carpenter, a 2015 OSI Community Fellow and, Walter Lomax, founder of the OSI-grantee Maryland Restorative Justice Initiative. Both Carpenter and Lomax received JPI’s Justice Champion Award for their work promoting the work of the Institute. Carpenter developed and operated his […]