Maryland became the first state to sign on to a novel and untried system to elect the president by popular vote as Gov. Martin O?Malley on Tuesday put his signature on 105 bills enacted by the General Assembly session that finished its work Monday night.
Maryland also joined a handful of states, including California, Illinois and New Jersey, that have agreed to divest their state pension systems from any investment in Sudan because of its genocide in Darfur.
Other bills signed, including a number of duplicate House and Senate versions of the same legislation, dealt with expunging arrest records, increasing subsidies for film production and key administration proposals for improving the operation of state government.
Maryland became the first state to join what is hoped to be a compact of states that will agree to cast their electoral votes ? the sum of their U.S. senators and representatives ? for the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote. If this system had been in effect, Vice President Al Gore would have won the 2000 election.
The state of Hawaii was the first state to pass the measure, but O?Malley?s signature made Maryland the first to put the proposal into law.
On the Sudan divestiture law, Maryland will move to unload from its $36 billion pension fund an estimated $150 million invested in 14 companies that do business with Sudan.
The legislation requires the state to contact the companies doing business with Sudan and try to persuade them to stop doing business there, and authorizes the pension board to unload the shares if the company refuses.
O?Malley also signed a bill that will eliminate the arrest records of people who were picked up by the police but never charged. The measure is designed to deal with people whose applications for employment, college and credit are spoiled by wide-ranging sweeps targeted at street crime.
Another bill the governor signed creates the StateStat program, which will measure the performance of state agencies “to make our government more open and transparent,” O?Malley said.
Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown will head a group that includes the secretaries of Business and Economic Development; Environment; Higher Education; Housing and Community Development; Labor, Licensing and Regulation; Planning; Transportation; and Budget and Management.
