Last year, it was porn. This year, it’s chickens***.
During the 2009 legislative session, State Sen. Andy Harris (R-Baltimore and Harford) threatened to defund this university if the pornographic film Pirates II was shown on campus. This year, both the House and Senate appropriations committees have threatened to take hundreds of thousands of dollars from the law clinic. Why? The Washington Post explains:
Apparently, it’s the law clinic’s pro bono work for an environmental group that is suing an Eastern Shore chicken farmer and the poultry giant Perdue Farms.
In that lawsuit, filed this month, the Assateague Coastal Trust alleges that polluted runoff from the farm, where the Hudson family raises chickens for Perdue, was fouling the Pocomoke River. Waste from the farm could flow to the Chesapeake Bay, carrying bacteria and fuel for oxygen-sucking algae blooms, the suit says.
A few weeks later, legislators proposed taking away hundreds of thousands of dollars from the law school’s budget unless the clinic spelled out exactly whom it has represented and how much it has spent on each client.
Like last year, students and professors are (rightly) complaining that the legislators are attacking their academic freedom.
Quick Hits
- Census cash can a powerful motivator: Rural state lawmakers want Maryland to count inmates as where they’re in prison, not where they live normally, according to Maryland Reporter.
- In the latest edition of “Things could be way worse than they are at UMCP,” we present: the elimination of degree programs! The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that dozens of doctoral and small bachelor’s programs have been cut nationwide during the recession.