Baltimore’s waste and abuse watchdog, Isabel Mercedes Cumming, says she will go to court to enforce a subpoena seeking records from the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Engagement and Safety (MONSE), in what represents a major escalation of her dispute with the Brandon Scott administration.

Last night, the IG Advisory Board approved Cumming’s request to hire pro bono outside counsel to enforce a January 27 subpoena issued by her office for unredacted MONSE financial and payroll records.

Outlining how the Scott administration has grown hostile to her office since it began investigating MONSE, Cumming said, “I’m letting the public know that everything has changed.”

Not only has her office’s access to city records been cut off, she said, its ability to guarantee confidentiality to sources coming forward about potential wrongdoing in city government has been compromised. “I don’t have the ability to allow confidentiality at this point, and that bothers me greatly.”

“This office is the office of the people, and never underestimate the power of the people,” she continued, calling on the public to contact their Maryland legislator and request that inspector general offices be added to an exception to disclosure limitations imposed by the Maryland Public Information Act.

“I’m letting the public know that everything has changed”  – IG Isabel Mercedes Cumming.

Under an opinion issued by Baltimore Solicitor Ebony Thompson, city agencies must withhold or redact personnel records and documents about individual finances requested by the OIG to stay within MPIA requirements.

This opinion follows an advisory letter to State Senator Antonio Hayes by the Maryland Attorney General’s office that cited a 2011 court case (Montgomery County v. Shropshire) that limited the Montgomery County inspector general’s access to personnel records in a liquor board case.

According to Thompson, the state MPIA law preempts the Baltimore City Charter that allows the IG broad access to city records to investigate complaints of government waste and corruption.

Cumming said the city Law Department has not responded to the January 27 subpoena for MONSE records, and Thompson has refused to hire independent counsel to help Cumming enforce the subpoena in court. (Conflict of interest rules bar city lawyers from representing both the OIG and the agency it sues.)

The advisory board approved a resolution authorizing Cumming to retain counsel to help the office enforcement any subpoena “at no cost to the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore and not implicating the expenditure of any tax revenue.”

Seven members approved the resolution, including chair Gayle Guilford. Three members, including LaVonda Reed, law dean at the University of Baltimore, and Renée H. Laurent, dean of the Francis King Carey School of Law at the University of Maryland, abstained.

The mayor’s office has not yet responded to The Brew’s request for comment. An out-of-office response from Thompson said she is away until February 16.

The Board of Estimates last month approved a $6,000 travel allowance for Thompson to travel to Hong Kong this week to attend Consensus 2026, described as “crypto’s most influential event” and sponsored by Coindesk.

Thompson said she is participating in the conference as part of her ongoing efforts to implement blockchain technology for Mayor Scott’s vacant housing initiative as well as “identifying new and innovative ways to utilize the technology in other aspects of city government operations.”

Focus on MONSE

In her eight years as inspector general, Cumming said she has only issued three internal subpoenas for records – all of them directed at MONSE, an agency established by Mayor Scott to administer his community violence reduction strategy and underwrite youth opportunity and re-entry programs.

Tensions between Cumming and the Scott administration broke out last October after her office issued a report on SideStep, a youth diversion program run by MONSE in partnership with the Police Department.

While SideStep’s effectiveness could not be determined because of poor record retention, there was evidence that recidivism rates among participants were much higher than reported to the City Council, the report said.

Because of “concerns surrounding the upcoming expansion” of the program, Cumming stated that her office “will be continuing the investigation and will provide a full report at its conclusion with recommendations.”

After the IG requested additional financial and payroll records from MONSE, a high-level Scott administrator approached Cumming in November with concerns about her office’s access to city records, Cumming told the board last night.

She said she met with the mayor and city solicitor in December to discuss her office’s access to records and suggested a further meeting, but no meeting took place and the records she requested from MONSE contained 200 pages redacted by the law department.

As a result, Cumming said she will be going to court to enforce the subpoena. She gave no exact timetable, but said she had been contacted by several law firms who have offered legal advice free of charge.

In the last two weeks of upheaval, her office has completed “three important reports” involving ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) funds given to the Scott administration, purchase cards used by top city staff, and permission leave for city officials.

“These reports are now with the mayor,” and public versions of the reports would require the mayor’s permission to be released. For the time being, “we will continue to work diligently for the citizens,” she said.