With the last ten days of the 2025 legislative session, county leaders still are watching for final outcomes on multiple major issues. We recap here, with links, and what we’re watching for in the days ahead.

Budget and BRFA – The House has moved its full fiscal plan, and the Senate has started its process. We expect a conference committee to resolve their differences, which look relatively minor compared to a more conventional year. Most of the county effects (shifting half the cost increase or teacher pensions in perpetuity, shifting 90% of the costs of state assessments, and some other aid and funding reductions) are in the BRFA, HB 352.

The late emergence of another county cost shift, for half of the amount of wrongful convictions that end in a state-approved compensation payment, continues to attract attention — particularly due to the weak link back to the county government, while State’s Attorneys are elected officials, not county appointees/hires. Expect that proposal to get more attention before the package is fully wrapped up.

What we’re expecting: A fairly smooth conference process, and a final vote on the package (on both floors, in identical fashion), some time next week, but not down-to-the-wire.

Blueprint an Education Changes – Here, the Senate appears ready to bundle a series of education policy changes into one bill, HB 504 introduced by the Administration as the “collaborative time” pause in the Blueprint program. The Senate plan appears to include the four-year “pause” in collaborative time, but protects more targeted funding streams from a carryover effect from that change. With the House effectively rejecting the funding pause completely (but delaying some operational requirement for a year), the two sides will need a resolution.

Also in the mix, likely within one bundled bill: several proposed new programs for teacher recruitment and support, a variety of requests for more flexibility and reporting ease coming from local school systems, and a plan forward for the governance and funding of career counseling services for high school students.

What we’re expecting: The ancillary parts of the bill appear to be on a fairly routine path toward reconciliation. The Blueprint and its funding supported by a special fund (and therefore not an impact on the beleaguered General Fund for this year) seems like a more difficult negotiation, with many pronouncements made earlier this year about whether such changes were even on the table.

Energy Policy and Facility Siting – Since the high-profile (and must-see) joint hearings on a trio of leadership-supported bills addressing energy sufficiency, generation siting, and future planning … no action yet on any of the bills, at least in formal settings. Word is that stakeholders continue to work aggressively toward compromises, and at least two bills to consolidate much of this policy are still planned to action down the stretch. For counties and the agriculture community, could this session bring some more clarity on how Maryland will manage the pressure to turn prime agricultural areas into solar energy sites? And for those concerned about the distribution grid, what new processes could apply to transmission lines and similarly intrusive infrastructure?

What we’re expecting: Either one, or two, concatenated bills likely should pass to change this landscape. For counties, the 2025 session feels like it could be a pivot point where more details of the siting process and what local communities are guaranteed in “livability” conditions, emerge and become more settled. Along with it, potential guardrails to reduce the effects on our most aggressively guarded preservation areas could make the outcome a new positive. Don’t be surprised if this takes all 90 days.

Affordable Housing – A broad, high-profile proposal from the Administration, its second in as many years, brought many stakeholders to the table again to sort out where a new State policy could overlay onto the inherently local processes of zoning and project approvals. A more streamlined bill, amended into HB 503, has moved from a House subcommittee and is up for discussion today (Friday) in the House’s full committee.

What’s on the table now is narrowed from the original bill, but still material. A set of state-determined goals for each jurisdiction, based on statewide and local factors, for new housing units. A Commission, with multiple stakeholders including local representatives, to work through a wide range of issues and issue its first report next summer. And, most consequentially, a new variant of “early vesting” for housing projects to ensure more regulatory certainty as they progress -a change from longstanding Maryland law, but intended as an incentive for more housing-focused projects to advance toward completion despite challenging market conditions.

What we’re expecting: The bill should have escaped the phase of technical/language concerns that have plagued it this far, and the House committee likely passes it in some form for floor debate early next week. The Senate would work from the House bill, and whether that path is smooth or complicated, there remains time for a narrowed bill to pass this session, despite missing crossover after a fairly late initial public hearing.

And a few more one-shots:

Extending the State’s pending Family Leave program is finally on track, with a clause protecting local governments from being charged or forced to escrow contributions to the State program if they are on track to use a private plan for these benefits (as we believe all counties are)…

Centralized collections, and data sharing, on short-term rentals through platforms like Airbnb, has received close attention by a Senate-led workgroup, and appears to be in shape to advance in the final week or session… expect many new guardrails, but the days of “taxation by litigation” may be on the way out…

Medication-assisted treatment for the incarcerated has been a multi-year priority, and a bill to codify a compromise path to ensure that it’s funded is… oddly stuck. Will the advance of a budget plan open the doors for this much-needed deal to support local services?

Property tax separated by property class finally got a Senate hearing, which was encouraging, giving hope that this important local flexibility may succeed this session… but more steps ahead in a technically complicated proposal…

And of course, MACo’s whole list of positions and testimony is online:

Visit our Legislative Tracking Database to read MACo’s position papers, watch bills for progress, or sort by the area that interests you.

And keep up with Conduit Street as we work down to the final hours of session!