The Maine Community Foundation’s new Roger N. Heald Fund has awarded $85,000 in grants to support conservation projects across Maine. The grantees include $10,000 to The Conservation Fund for an acquisition project in the 100-Mile Wilderness along the Appalachian Trail.

The public board that oversees Mayo Regional Hospital has voted to begin a merger with Northern Light Health, the statewide health care organization that’s based in Brewer and includes Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor. The board members, who are elected from 13 Piscataquis County communities served by the hospital and who oversee a quasi-municipal entity known as Hospital Administrative District No. 4, approved the merger agreement in a 15-3 vote during a meeting Wednesday night, Feb. 27.

There will be plenty of room on the bench for the Greenville High School girls basketball team for Saturday’s 2:05 p.m. state Class D championship game in Bangor against defending champ Southern Aroostook of Dyer Brook. That’s because the Lakers have only eight players on the roster.

Gage Stone’s wrestling postseason didn’t get off to a great start, but it’s on a much higher trajectory these days. The junior from Dexter Regional High School is set to leave Thursday for Providence, Rhode Island, the site of this weekend’s New England interscholastic championships.

Dexter Regional High School recently held its annual Winter Carnival Week Feb. 11-15. The week concluded with a dance where the Winter Carnival court was crowned: grade 12 King Dillion Allen and Queen Addyson Herrick, grade 11 Prince Logan Perkins and Princess Caitlyn Hardy, grade 10 Duke Parker Ponte and Duchess Cheyenne Beem and grade 9 Lord Camron Allen and Lady Elizabeth Kinney.

Maine lawmakers on the Veterans and Legal Affairs committee on Friday will hold a public hearing on a pair of bills -- LDs 418 and 816 -- which would bind Maine’s Electoral College votes to the winner of the national popular vote.

A fisherman I have always been; and a fisherman I will always be, until I join my late fishing friend Wiggie Robinson, who no doubt is up there paddling the Silver Canoe.

Maine's highest court has denied another appeal of a Guilford man convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend and the toddler she was babysitting. Jeffrey Cookson sought a new trial for the 1999 killings in Dexter based on a provision of Maine's DNA statute.

There is an expectation in this Republic that the duly elected representative of the people will represent the people. Not so for the voters of Congressional District 2 (CD2) in the state of Maine. As the freshman representative from New York, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, has established herself as the standard bearer of the Democrat Party, Jared Golden, the freshman representative from Maine who campaigned on standing up to his party, is content to offer his silence as consent.

The Center Theatre recently announced that registration is open for all the 2019 drama camps, including a new two-week drama camp being offered in Monson. The Theatre is also offering an April vacation camp at Central Hall in Dover-Foxcroft as well as the two classic drama camps taking place at the East Sangerville Grange.