Kathy Klausmeier (D) was sworn in Tuesday as the 15th Baltimore County executive — and the first woman to hold that position in county history. She has served three decades in the Maryland General Assembly. Photo by Danielle E. Gaines.
Baltimore County has its first woman county executive following the appointment Tuesday of Kathy Klausmeier by the Baltimore County Council.
Klausmeier, a Democrat with three decades of experience in the state legislature, was tapped after a search process that began last year. A dozen people applied to complete the term of Johnny Olszewski Jr. (D), who left the county executive’s job to serve in the House of Representatives.
Klausmeier was sworn in less than 24 hours before the Maryland General Assembly begins the 2025 session. Klausmeier promised to move quickly.
“Our work will begin in earnest tomorrow morning, as I begin meeting with our leadership team and key staff,” she said. “We have much to do in the next 23 months, and I fully expect this transition phase will be brief and productive.”
Klausmeier, in brief remarks following her swearing in, vowed to invest in county services, including schools, and improve public safety.
“But at the same time, we must continue to grow our economy, create jobs, address the county’s housing shortage and make government services more streamlined and efficient, and that goes for permitting, especially,” she said.
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The appointment of Klausmeier closes a search that began late last year when Olszewski was elected to Congress.
Several of the seven council members council were already considering campaigns in 2026 to succeed Olszewski, who was in his second term and barred by term limits from seeking a third.
But no one on the council could secure the four votes necessary to complete Olszewski’s final 23 months in office. That made it necessary to search for a candidate who likely would not run for the office at the end of the term.
Olszewski resigned before being sworn into Congress on Friday.
It is the second time since 2018 that the council has had to appoint an executive to complete a term. The last time was in 2018, when a vacancy was created by the sudden death of then-County Executive Kevin Kamenetz. The council named Don Mohler, a senior aide to Kamenetz, to serve the remaining six months of Kamenetz’s term.
The selection of Klausmeier marks a number of milestones. She is the first woman to serve as Baltimore County Executive since the position was created in 1956. She is also the first resident of Perry Hall to hold that office.
Finally, Klausmeier, at the time of her swearing in Tuesday, was older than any of her 14 predecessors at the time they took office. She turns 75 next month. Previously, Mohler had been the oldest at the time he was sworn in.
Klausmeier served more than two decades in the Senate — including two years as vice chair of the Senate Finance Committee. Before that she served eight years in the House of Delegates.
With Klausmeier’s resignation to become county executive, there are three vacancies in the Senate Democratic Caucus: Klausmeier’s seat, the seat in District 30 that was held by now-U.S. Rep. Sarah K. Elfreth (D), and the 41st District seat, where Sen. Jill P. Carter (D-Baltimore City) recently resigned after being nominated to the State Board of Contract Appeals.
The Anne Arundel County Democratic Central Committee on Saturday narrowly recommended nominating Del. Shaneka Henson (D) to replace Elfreth in the Senate.
David Schuhlein, a spokesperson for Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City), said Tuesday that Ferguson was not yet prepared to say who would take over for Klausmeier as vice chair of the Senate Finance Committee.
It’s conceivable that all three of the district’s delegates — Nick Allen (D), Harry Bhandari (D) and Carl Jackson (D) — could apply for the Senate vacancy.
“I’m still in the contemplative phase,” Allen said in an interview Tuesday.
Allen said he and his colleagues have discussed the possibility that they could be competing against each other for the appointment, and they have also considered whether to reach a consensus and recommend one for the Senate seat.
Bhandari was elected to the House in 2018. Jackson was appointed to his seat in 2019, after then-Del. Eric Bromwell (D) took a job with the Baltimore County government, and Jackson won a full term in 2022. Allen was elected in 2022.
“We have great choices in District 8,” Allen said. “Compared to Kathy, Harry, Karl and I are novices.”