According to today’s Baltimore Sun, a spokesperson the mayor’s office has stated that Baltimore will not commission an economic impact study of this year’s Grand Prix. The official, Ryan O’Doherty, noted that a 2011 study of the race “confirmed what we know is an undisputed fact and that is the event has a significant positive economic impact,” but not everyone is convinced, including UMBC economics professor Dennis Coates.

Coates conducted an economic impact study on the 2011 Grand Prix, based on surveys of race-goers, that showed less positive figures than reported by the mayor’s office. Responding to O’Doherty’s statement Coates remarked, “They can rewrite history and they can claim pretty much anything because no one else will see the hard numbers.” He continued that from their perspective, “It’s better to not do an economic impact study than have unflattering numbers.”

It is not yet clear if or when the city will disclose how many people attended the 2012 Baltimore Grand Prix. O’Doherty said the city would release the amount of tax proceeds, but that information might not be available until the end of October.

UMBC’s Caitlyn Leiter-Mason ’14, GWST and political science, and Mitch Case ’11, MCS, are in Charlotte this week serving as delegates to the Democratic National Convention, reports Patch. Leiter-Mason, a Sondheim Public Affairs Scholar and contributor to USDemocrazy, represents Maryland’s 6th District. Case, social media coordinator at the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, represents Maryland’s 7th District.

Curious about how they got to Charlotte and what they hope to achieve? See their Tumblr A Tale of Two Delegates, read “Ellicott City delegate works to energize young voters” in the Baltimore Sun and listen to their interview on the Marc Steiner Show.

Donald F. Norris, professor and chairman of UMBC’s Department of Public Policy, also appeared in the Baltimore Sun, commenting on the rise of Howard County Executive Ken Ulman, who is in Charlotte this week as chair of the National Democratic County Officials. When asked if this role would boost Ulman’s chances in a gubernatorial race, Norris noted it “shows that he has some image within the Democratic Party outside of the state,” but, he concluded, “I don’t think that translates into votes or necessarily money.”

“On campus, the good side of politics” is new Baltimore Sun op-ed written by David Hoffman, UMBC Assistant Director of Student Life for Civic Agency, and SGA President Kaylesh Ramu ’13, political science.

Hoffman and Ramu offer hope to readers who are “understandably skeptical about politics and public life” in this time of government gridlock and discord. They write that at UMBC, “students are helping lead the way to a new kind of politics that bridges difference and strengthens communities.”

The piece goes on to explore the civic engagement work underway at UMBC—carried forward by the BreakingGround initiative—as well as its roots in our campus culture and its implications for our broader democracy. Comments? Offer your thoughts, post your questions and share your experiences on the BreakingGround blog.

Donald F. Norris, professor and chairman of UMBC’s Department of Public Policy, appeared twice in this weekend’s Baltimore Sun, quoted on the Baltimore Grand Prix’s potential to impact Mayor Rawlings-Blake’s political career and on expectations for Governor O’Malley’s upcoming speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention.

Norris told the Sun that he does not expect the the Grand Prix, as a success or failure, to have a lasting effect on the mayor’s career. “Mayors are not made or unmade based upon sporting events,” he said. “If it’s a success, she claims the success and it’s a good thing. If it’s a failure, she can blame someone else.”

He was also optimistic about O’Malley’s DNC speech, which the Sun called “the most important speech of his political career.” Norris remarked, “This is a huge opportunity for O’Malley, and clearly it has come in recognition of his rising star within the party.”

“Obama’s speech Thursday night will not be the most important of his career, nor even his most important electoral speech…But Charlotte ain’t Denver, and this moment calls for neither hope nor change,” writes Thomas F. Schaller, professor of political science at UMBC, in his latest Salon column.

Schaller suggests, ‘What it calls for instead is an unapologetic defense of four years worthy of this president’s historical measure.” He expects Obama to tout the successes of his first term, but “to do so in humble, even sober tones,” given the country’s ongoing economic challenges and a less optimistic outlook than dominated the 2008 election.

For more on the Obama campaign’s 2012 approach and expectations for both President Obama and Vice President Biden’s DNC speeches, see Schaller’s column in the Baltimore Sun.

When war strikes in a distant nation, the only way that many Americans experience it is through the lens of the journalists and photographers who risk life and limb to get the shots that capture war’s horrors and tragedies. But what is the personal cost for those who show such courage?

Assessing that human cost to the chroniclers of war is the essence of Donald Maguiles’ play Time Stands Still, which opened last week at Baltimore’s Everyman Theatre with UMBC alumni Eric Messner ’01, acting,  and Mandy Moore ’07, acting, among its ensemble.

“When I was at UMBC I used to go and see shows at Everyman Theatre,” Messner recalls, “then for a time after graduating, I lived five blocks away from the theatre. It’s a place where I’ve always wanted to work, and now I’m getting that chance….  I’m so proud that I get to open the final season in their Charles Street space, the same space that I would go to see their plays when I was at school.”

Moore observes that “there are some very big fascinating questions being asked in our production.  I feel lucky to play such fun, joyful role in the discussion.  It’s that sharp kind of theatre where you are asked questions and not told what to think.”

“It’s a really great play,” Messner concurs. “There’s just so much going on emotionally and Donald Margulies has such a wonderful gift for writing dialogue.”

Time Stands Still runs at Everyman Theatre through Sunday, October 7. For more information and tickets, go to  http://everymantheatre.org/.

Mitch Case ’11, media & communication studies, and current UMBC junior Caitlyn Leiter-Mason, a Sondheim Public Affairs Scholar majoring in Gender & Women’s Studies and Political Science, are blogging about their experiences as delegates to the Democratic National Convention this week in Charlotte, NC.

Their shared blog, A Tale of Two Delegates, follows their adventures as delegates for President Obama representing Maryland’s 6th and 7th districts (Leiter-Mason and Case, respectively).

Leiter-Mason is the current president of UMBC College Democrats, and Case served as president when he attended UMBC.

Read more at UMBC’s BreakingGround site. BreakingGround is at the forefront of a vibrant, new movement toward increased campus and community engagement—a movement that is now gaining ground nationally. In early 2012, two widely heralded reports called on higher education to play a central role in renewing American democracy and preparing citizens to tackle the challenges of our age.

John Rennie Short, professor of public policy at UMBC and expert on urban and environmental issues and political geography, has published the first general history of Korea as seen through maps. Korea: A Cartographic History, from the University of Chicago Press, provides a visually stunning introduction to how Korea has been represented through maps over the last 600 years. The book description reads:

A common theme running throughout Short’s study is how the global flow of knowledge and ideas affects mapmaking, and Short reveals how Korean mapmakers throughout history have embodied, reflected, and even contested these foreign depictions of their homeland.

Reviewers call the book “superb” and “masterful.” Laura Hostetler (University of Illinois at Chicago) writes, “Both a history of cartography and a cartographic history, John Rennie Short’s highly readable and beautifully illustrated book recounts the absorbing story of Korea’s integration into global space with accuracy and aplomb.”