OC Today WWW.OCEANCITYTODAY.COM
FEBRUARY 17, 2023
BOAT SHOW
CALLING ALL ANGLERS
Ocean City Seaside Boat Show set for Feb. 17-19 at Roland E. Powell Convention Center – Page 51
SERVING NORTHERN WORCESTER COUNTY
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Baltimore Ave. project delayed again Downtown utility line work assigned lower priority as expenses continue to rise By Mallory Panuska Staff Writer (Feb. 17, 2023) Plans to upgrade Baltimore Avenue took another hit this week as Ocean City Council members opted not to include it in a bond issue for the next fiscal year.
During a discussion at a work session Tuesday about the city’s capital improvement plan — made up of 45 high-dollar projects now ranked from critical to future consideration — most council members agreed that this is not the year to send the estimated roughly $40 million project out to the market for funding. “Baltimore Avenue is totally functional,” Councilman John Gehrig said while explaining why he ranked the
project a 5, the lowest possible classification, among the proposed projects. “No one ever contacts us and says, ‘I can’t believe I came into town and this Baltimore Avenue has power lines all over it.’ No one ever says that.” He and Council President Matt James argued that the project, which has been in the works for years and aims to bury utilities lines and up-
grade the sidewalks from North Division to 15th streets, moved down the chain after they learned the cost more than doubled in September. They both ranked the project a 5, while Councilwoman Carol Proctor ranked it a 4, Councilman Will Savage and Mayor Rick Meehan ranked it a 3, and Councilmen Peter Buas, Tony DeLuca and Frank Knight classified it a 2. See BALTIMORE Page 4
AGH systems back online after attack Hospital reports function restored without sharing info on specific response
LISA CAPITELLI/OCEAN CITY TODAY
PERCH WITH A VIEW
A blue heron stands on the rail of a walkway and looks around Northside Park on 125th Street in Ocean City. Visitors will typically see two herons roaming around the park.
Bus, tram fares likely to go up for summer By Mallory Panuska Staff Writer (Feb. 17, 2023) Ocean City’s transportation budget could see a more than $485,000 revenue boost this year with the City Council’s approval
of a proposed $1 increase in bus and tram fares. Members of the resort’s Transportation Committee began toying with the idea of raising the rates last month, given that they have been
held at $3 all day for buses and $4 for Boardwalk trams since 2011. Now, with rising costs for fuel, driver and conductor salaries, and overall business operations, staff and committee See BUS Page 3
By Mallory Panuska Staff Writer (Feb. 17, 2023) Systems are back online at Atlantic General Hospital following a cybersecurity attack that completely shut down the network for just over two weeks. According to a news release issued Monday from Toni Keiser, the hospital’s vice president of public relations, the facility’s outpatient walk-in lab and outpatient imaging department are now open and fully operational. The return to normalcy followed a hectic two weeks of hospital personnel taking care of business without use of the hospital’s central computer system. Staff members discovered something was off within the system early on Jan. 29 after they began experiencing technical difficulties, which resulted in the disruption to some services. While the lab and outpatient services came back online Monday, paSee AGH Page 6