A 132,153-home deficit for its poorest renters, a capital region tying for America's worst commute, $63 billion of documented water need — and, thanks to a one-of-a-kind hospital rate-setting system, the rare state where no rural hospital screens at risk of closing.
How to read this page: the class chip on every measure is the honesty label. Counted = an inspection or enumeration record. Modeled = a study's projection or risk score — printed with the modeler's name. Assessed = a structured survey of required investment — needs as documented, not measurements of decay. Figures keep the form their source gave them; years are printed on every measure.
Click any category to expand it — every measure with its figure, what it means in plain language, and its source.
Every measure carries its value, class, geography, year, definition, context and source. Three Maryland-specific cautions are printed rather than smoothed over. Hospitals: Maryland's all-payer rate-setting (the HSCRC) produces a CHQPR screen of 0 of 9 rural hospitals at risk — the lowest medical-risk reading in this series — and the defnote explains the mechanism instead of letting the zero look like missing data; Chartis published no Maryland-specific vulnerable count in the sources reviewed, so none is printed. Dams: Maryland publishes a high-hazard count (107) but withholds dam condition assessments — the AP's 2023 state-by-state condition analysis excludes Maryland for non-compliance — so no poor-condition share is printed for Maryland. Power: Maryland's capacity exposure is regional (PJM), so the two regional measures are labelled regional and the Maryland-zone load figure is given alongside.
Instruments are never blended: USDA's surveyed household rate (11.5%) and Feeding America's modelled individual count (824,930) sit side by side unmerged; TTI's per-commuter hour and metro-total delay are labelled as different instruments; NLIHC's ELI deficit (132,153) is not mixed with the Maryland Comptroller's broader all-incomes shortfall (~100,000 units, cited as context in the housing defnote); and ASCE's 2026 water figures are printed with ASCE's own 2024 figures alongside, because the EPA survey basis broadened between the two reports. News-flagged: one measure — the 2026 closure of Cecil County's only hospital birth centre — is sourced to news reporting (Baltimore Banner) and is flagged on its record.
Severity scores are editorial (0–100 band), calibrated against the other states in this series — Maryland's range (46–82) reflects a state that is simultaneously near the national worst for worst-case housing availability and congestion, and near the national best on the rural-hospital screen.