Maryland’s newest department already had a tall order: to “advance social and economic mobility for all Marylanders,” as Acting Secretary Walter Simmons describes it.

Then, two days after the law creating the Department of Social and Economic Mobility took effect, the federal government made the job more challenging by declaring that race- and sex-based eligibility for Disadvantaged Business Enterprise status was discriminatory. It’s a change that Simmons estimates could affect up to 7,000 businesses in the state.

But Simmons remained largely confident Friday in a briefing for the House Health and Government Operations Committee on the role of the new department and the efforts to stand it up. It was the first public appearance for the agency.

The hearing came one day after the driving

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