Starting July 1, residents in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., will see significant changes as a range of new laws come into effect. 

These laws, signed by Governors Glenn Youngkin and Wes Moore, cover various issues from banning cat declawing and child marriages to prohibiting auto sears and cracking down on ticket price scams. 

Additionally, D.C. will implement the highest minimum wage in the country, aiming to ensure fair wages for all workers.

Virginia laws going into effect July 1

In Virginia, Governor Glenn Youngkin signed 777 bills this session.

July 1 brings with it a ban on declawing cats, a ban on child marriages, and prohibits legacy admissions at public higher education institutes.

There is also new legislation that bans “auto sears” — also known as Glock switches.

Those are devices that can convert a semiautomatic firearm into a fully automatic weapon that is able to rapidly fire a full magazine of bullets.

Delegate Michael Jones sponsored HB-22 – one of only two gun laws passed by the governor.

“It’s not your average gun owner who is going to have these, it’s people who are out there trying to hurt innocent people, innocent bystanders,” Jones said. “It’s going to keep us safe and make our streets a little safer.”

Maryland laws going into effect July 1 

Moving into Maryland, Governor Wes Moore signed 1,049 bills into law. 

Some changes you will see come July 1 include a ban on vaping in indoor spaces, public transportation, and workplaces, as well as alcohol delivery being allowed from permitted businesses.

And Maryland is cracking down on those wild ticket prices we have seen for concerts and shows lately – becoming the first state in the country to fine resellers and platforms that offer “speculative” tickets – tickets they don’t even own but sell anyway, driving up prices for everyone.

This was Maryland State Senator Dawn Gile’s bill. 

She said it is in response to outrage from consumers, and she hopes it changes people’s perspectives on what it means to buy tickets.

“People have just become accustomed that this is what they have to do – pay these astronomical ticket prices to see a show but that’s not the way it should be,” Gile said.  “There’s deception in the marketplace, there’s a manipulation in the marketplace of these prices and we can have a fair marketplace.”

Another one going into effect in Maryland on July 1 is called Nick’s Law – which calls for stricter boating rules and punishments when it comes to boating under the influence.

It’s named after Nick Barton, a 21-year-old college lacrosse player who was killed in a boating accident in June 2022 by someone who was drinking.

His mom, Marie Barton, has been fighting to make Maryland waterways safer ever since.

“After I lost Nick, I started looking into everything and I could not believe the law – or the lack of laws, I should say,” Barton said.

Nick’s Law prohibits a person from operating a vessel for two years if they are convicted of boating under the influence and five years if it results in death

“It also gives DNR a database which they have never had before to be able to track these boaters that aren’t supposed to be on the water,” Barton explained.

DC laws going into effect July 1

Muriel Bowser, mayor of the District of Columbia, during an interview in Washington, DC, US, on Friday, Oct. 13, 2023. This summer Bowser and DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said they were united in opposition to a federal measure overhauling poli

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The minimum wage is increasing in the District of Columbia on July 1, to $17.50 per hour for non-tipped workers, the highest in the United States.

The DC Department of Employment Services (DOES) sent FOX 5 the following statement.

“Mayor Bowser’s commitment to creating more pathways to the middle class remains a priority. 

Starting July 1, the District’s minimum wage will increase to $17.50 per hour for non-tipped workers and $10.00 per hour for tipped employees. 

This adjustment is crucial for ensuring workers receive fair wages and our employers comply with D.C. wage laws. 

As an undergraduate engineering student in Delhi, India, Amisha Bhaskar took a field trip to a facility for disabled war veterans and met a man who had lost both hands. When she asked him what technologies could improve his life, his reply left an indelible impression: He wanted something so he could take care of himself and not be forced to rely upon others.

Now a second-year doctoral student at the University of Maryland studying computer science, Bhaskar has focused on the wounded veteran’s broad request as her area of study. Working with others in the Robotics Algorithms & Autonomous Systems Lab, she is developing an innovative robotic tool to help people with mobility impairments feed themselves.

The team’s work was recognized last month at the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Yokohama, Japan, where a paper Bhaskar presented as lead co-author received top honors in a specialized workshop on cooking and robotics.

Existing robotic-assisted feeding technology is very limited, the UMD researchers said. Commercial robotic arms have a fixed, pre-programmed motion that allows them to pick up food only in a specific spot on a plate, and they lack the ability to detect whether they’ve accomplished that task.

“They are not learning on the go, so it will just keep doing this motion no matter if you want to eat it or not, or if the food is picked up or not,” said Bhaskar.

Robotic-assisted feeding can be divided into two steps, she explained: the “acquisition” step involves a utensil picking up the food, while the transfer step is the process of the food reaching a person’s mouth without being dropped or succumbing to some other mishap.

Bhaskar and the UMD team are currently working on the acquisition step, with a lofty goal. While other research groups sometimes count picking up food on a utensil just once as a success, the UMD team’s target is to clear the plate.

The system must be able to recognize and transport a variety of foods served in assisted-care settings—from liquid foods to semi-solid ones like yogurt and tofu to cereals.

One of the most significant challenges for a robot is handling foods with varied textures and consistencies within a single dish, the researchers said. Ramen, for example, presents a complex scenario that includes a liquid broth, squishy tofu, solid vegetables and irregularly shaped noodles that remain the biggest challenge, Bhaskar said. “Every single element requires different strategies, some of which have to be combined,” she said

An interdisciplinary approach has played a key role in the project’s success, said Pratap Tokekar, an associate professor of computer science with an appointment in the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies.

“The technology we’re working on involves computer vision, artificial intelligence, deep neural networks, mechanical engineering and more—it all needs to come together seamlessly so that the robotic system is both safe for users and efficient in accomplishing the task at hand,” he said.

Tokekar is academic adviser to Bhaskar and another graduate student working on the project, Rui Liu, a third-year doctoral student in computer science.

Robotic-assisted feeding is a relatively new area of research for Liu, who had previously focused on computer vision and human-robot interaction. But like Bhaskar, Liu sees the potential here to greatly improve people’s lives, particularly older adults or those with mobility issues that make feeding themselves difficult.

Additional team members include Vishnu D. Sharma, Ph.D. ’24 and Guangyao Shi, Ph.D. ’23, now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Southern California.

While the project is probably several years away from real-world application, Tokekar is confident in the team’s progress, and particularly in Bhasker’s and Liu’s eagerness and intense focus.

“The best part of this project is that every time we meet, they have 10 new ideas since the last time that we met,” Tokekar said. “Instead of me telling them what to do, they already know what to do. I’m just helping shape their ideas.”