Central Maryland

The Central Maryland metropolitan region is the dominant urban area surrounding the city of Baltimore. Its population of 2.7 million people is spread across seven counties: Anne Arundel, Carroll, Harford, Howard, and Queen Anne’s counties, plus the city and county of Baltimore. Though the Charm City is the most well-known in the region, Central Maryland is also home to the other major communities of Columbia, Towson, and the state capital, Annapolis.

As the state’s main metro area, Central Maryland is an economic powerhouse. While more than a quarter of the city of Baltimore’s jobs are found in the service economy, major businesses also maintain local headquarters, including T. Rowe Price, Under Armour, and spice giant McCormick & Company. Baltimore’s economy is fed by the presence of its busy seaport, an important hub on the Atlantic. 

As home to many of the state’s largest sources of economic opportunity, businesses based in Central Maryland may encounter applicants from many different counties. Casting a wide net often makes it easier to find individuals who are best-suited for open positions. However, it also makes it critical for employers to ensure applicants’  behavior  (and criminal record) is in line with their qualifications. 

Vetting applicants with background checks is an important step that becomes even more critical when hiring within a metro region. Vetting policies which rely exclusively on local background checks have the potential to miss records held in an adjacent county where an applicant lived previously—records that may be critical to your employment decision. To ensure that every hiring decision is based on facts, develop a metro-wide background check policy.

Such a policy must adhere to the rules for fair hiring in Maryland. Most important to note is the city and county of Baltimore’s “ban the box” rules, which apply to all businesses employing 10 or more people. Employers must delay both background checks and criminal history inquiries until after extending a conditional offer of employment. The state’s Office of Fair Practices warns that employers should generally not ask applicants about their record unless a conviction has a direct bearing on the job role in question. Expunged records are not permissible for use during the vetting process. 

Employers must carefully navigate these requirements to conduct their due diligence appropriately. With these stipulations in mind, transitioning to metro-wide background checks is a forward-thinking choice. By expanding your search to all the counties in Central Maryland, you can cover far more ground and enhance certainty in your hiring decisions. 

backgroundchecks.com makes record searches for the Central Maryland metro area accessible and easy. For Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Carroll, Harford, Howard, and Queen Anne's counties and the city of Baltimore, you can request an instant criminal record search through US OneSEARCH. This product also returns results from our sources across all 50 states plus Guam and Puerto Rico. For those who prefer to scale down the scope, choose a Maryland-exclusive search. Prefer something in the middle? A regionalized OneSEARCH will also offer useful results from the same county and state-level sources while allowing you to customize your search for up to five states.

These detailed reports contain data pulled from criminal information systems such as Baltimore's gun offender registry along with Maryland's Department of Corrections, Administrative Office of the Courts, and the state sex offender registry. For the  Adminstrative  Office, available court records begin in 1999 and are updated monthly to maintain currency. Records returned from this system may include information such as the  subject's :
 

• Name
• Date or month and year of birth
• Case number, type, and current status
• Descriptions of criminal  offenses
• Disposition and disposition date

Equipped with this kind of data, you can conclude the hiring process with peace of mind. Explore what these tools can do for your business as you enter the ongoing search for the strongest and most suitable candidates for open job roles.