Maryland General Assembly kicks off

Maryland kicked off its legislative session Wednesday and according to our local representatives they've already hit the ground running.

At the top of the to-do list combating the state's estimated $290 million deficit. Del. Charles Otto (R) said with that deficit budget cuts will have to be made.

Another key item increasing the amount of highway user revenue that goes back to local governments.  

Money from things like gasoline tax is shared with local jurisdictions for road repairs.  

At one point local governments were seeing about 30-percent Otto said, but that was cut drastically over the past decade.  

Otto said they will push to restore that this session. 

"They need it for the snow removal and its impacted other programs in the county to as far as education and all that because a certain amount of it had to be made up with local revenues," Otto said. 

The Eastern Shore delegation also plans to closely monitor legislation concerning animal cruelty.