1520                             LAWS OF MARYLAND                       [CH. 900

purposes. The County Commissioners of Howard County are hereby
authorized and empowered to adopt a Housing Code for Howard
County and to incorporate into the Housing Code of Howard County
specifications and data by reference to the Howard County Fire
Prevention Code, the Howard County Building Code, and the rules
and regulations of the Metropolitan Commission, and data so re-
ferred to shall have the same force and effect as if printed in its
entirety in the said Housing Code of Howard County.

(b) The County Commissioners may exercise all or any part of
the powers granted hereunder, but no rules and regulations adopted
by the County Commissioners of Howard County under the said
powers shall be deemed valid or effective unless the same shall have
been formally adopted by the said County Commissioners at a regular
meeting held after the holding of a public hearing, said [meeting]
hearing to be duly advertised for three weeks in advance in one or
more newspapers of general circulation in the county, and notice
of the adoption of rules and regulations shall thereafter have been
published at least two times in one or more newspapers of general
circulation in Howard County. Said notice may, in the sole and
absolute discretion of the County Commissioners, contain a brief
and concise statement or short summary of the rules and regulations
adopted. After formal adoption of rules and regulations and pub-
lication of notice as herein provided, all persons shall be deemed
and taken to have notice thereof and no actual notice need be proven.
It shall be the duty of the County Commissioners to cause said rules
and regulations to be available at its office for inspection by the
public at any time, and the County Commissioners are authorized to
have printed and made available for public distribution such number
of copies of any rules and regulations so adopted, as they may deem
necessary and proper, and may require the payment of a reasonable
charge for any printed copies so furnished. A printed certificate by
the Chief Clerk of the County Commissioners that any rules and
regulations have been adopted pursuant to the authority of this
section, and that a copy of the rules and regulations to which the
certificate is attached is a true and correct copy, shall be deemed
and taken as sufficient to permit the introduction of such rules and
regulations as prima facie evidence of their existence in any judicial
proceedings. All powers, privileges, restrictions, duties and discretion
vested in or imposed upon the County Commissioners with respect
to the adoption of any rules or regulations, hereunder, shall apply
with equal force and effect to the change, repeal or amendment of
any or all of said rules and regulations, in whole or in part.

Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That this Act shall take effect
June 1, 1965.

Approved May 4, 1965.

CHAPTER 900
(House Bill 935)

AN ACT to repeal and re-enact, with amendments, Section 18 (k)
of Article 2-B of the Annotated Code of Maryland (1957 Edition