Close to home: final action on allowing local school systems flexibility in mask policy. Plus, the General Assembly continues to churn through its calendar with many bills, for good or ill, crossing over or getting crucial hearings. Be sure to check our Weekly Memo for the ones that matter the most. And we hear from our allied folks at our national affiliate People's Action about what needs your attention at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, down where the Metrorail lines cross. See it all in this roundup of News You Can Use.

Maryland's Senate leadership, initially cautious about the highly popular paid family leave concept, yesterday got on board, as this article from Maryland Matters shows.

Find out more about this bill and its backers -- including Progressive Maryland, who testified in its favor to a House committee Feb. 15 -- in our BlogSpace.

Progressive Maryland has testified Feb. 15 in an Assembly hearing in support of Maryland House Bill 8, the “Time to Care” act, which “would give workers up to 12 weeks paid time off to take care of a newborn, themselves or a loved one who has serious medical conditions.” Find out more about the bill and see our testimony below.

Yesterday would have been the 82nd birthday of the late civil rights leader and Congressman John Lewis. Representative Lewis was well-known for encouraging people to make "good trouble" — the kind of trouble that gets stirred up when you fight injustice, as Lewis did with courage throughout his life. 

Let's remember to draw inspiration from Rep. Lewis in moments when progressive change feels difficult or distant. We are committed to continuing to organize, agitate, and make good trouble around the issues that affect working people until we live in a society that treats everyone with dignity and respect. We hope you'll stand with us. 

Our leverage for peace seems limited, especially this morning, but we can work for justice here in Maryland and in the nation because when justice is done, peace is more likely. News you can use from Maryland and the progressive-possible landscape in the US are just below:

Where to get news you can use in Maryland? The landscape is shifting under us every day, as this roundup from Baltimore Fishbowl outlines. Financial squeezes on the legacy media all over the world are bringing change, not all of it good, and it's getting harder to tell well-grounded, factual news from misinformation.

Happy Valentine's Day! Here's the Weekly Memo from Progressive Maryland — your road map for progressive action in this and coming weeks. We can do it. Change starts today.

Where is the love on Valentine's Day? Not much we can (or want to) do about squabbling factions in the state GOP. But pressuring our state and federal officials about people- and family-centered laws and rules, keeping businesspersons' hands out of our pockets and securing our workplaces -- that's in our grasp. Take a look at the work going on at every level and team up with advocates and activists to make change.

Much of our focus in these cold, early months of 2022 has been on Annapolis, and so far we’ve encountered the good, the bad, and – well – the unsurprising...

Biden and Harris visit Upper Marlboro to strengthen workers' organizing clout around the nation. Plus, fighting eviction, wasting taxpayer money on bad financial advice, harsher sentencing vs. harm reduction. These and other news accounts give us all an edge against isolation in workplace and community. Share the news and use it to fight back.