For the past 18 years, the BDN has partnered with registered Maine guide Dan Legere to give away what many winners called the trip of a lifetime: A daylong drift down one of Maine's classic fly-fishing rivers. This year, unfortunately, we won't be holding that trip after all.

Maine Sen. Angus King and several Democrats in the U.S. Senate called on Wednesday for a future stimulus bill aimed at coronavirus relief to include money to support local news organizations. King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, signed a letter with 18 Senate Democrats that characterized local news organizations as “in a state of crisis” that was only “exacerbated” by the coronavirus pandemic. 

The Rose and Samuel Rudman Library Trust of the Maine Community Foundation has awarded grants totaling $23,895 to 32 libraries in Aroostook, Hancock, Knox, Penobscot, Piscataquis, Waldo and Washington counties. Among the recipients is the Shaw Public Library of Greenville, for books on the history of Maine, emphasizing the importance of Native Americans, African Americans and women

Gov. Janet Mills directed the Maine National Guard and the Maine Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) to work with Maine’s health care systems to open two alternative care sites in Portland and Bangor as part of the state’s preparations to bolster Maine health system capacity in the face of COVID-19. 

Towns and cities whose usual polling locations have closed because of the coronavirus pandemic are waiting for guidance from the state on how or whether the June 9 primary will happen before they choose new locations and make other arrangements for voting.

The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention has spent a month modeling how the new coronavirus might spread. The scenarios are wide-ranging. 

Despite a lack of recorded cases of the coronavirus in Piscataquis County as of Tuesday morning, county officials are still exercising caution in daily operations with facilities on the East Main St. campus mostly closed to the public and limited staff working on site. Gov. Janet Mills announced stricter limits on public gatherings last month, including banning gatherings of more than 10 people, the Piscataquis County Commissioners met via teleconference for the April 7 meeting.

More than three weeks after Maine confirmed its first case of the new coronavirus, the state has recorded cases in all but one of its 16 counties. As of Monday, Piscataquis County was the only one without a confirmed case of the fast-spreading infection that has caused a pandemic and shut down much of daily life. Two other counties, Aroostook and Washington, both recorded their first cases last week.

The death toll started on a Monday -- Sept. 23, 1918, to be exact. William Lawry, a 36-year-old Augusta resident, had fallen ill while visiting Camp Devens, an army facility in Massachusetts that had been stricken by influenza, and had returned home a few days earlier to recuperate. 

President Trump has approved a federal disaster declaration for Maine due to the coronavirus, Gov. Janet Mills said Saturday. The "major" disaster declaration will unlock federal funding assistance for the state and municipalities throughout Maine.

Citing a continuing goal of reducing moose density in certain areas in order to cut down the effect of winter ticks on the herd, Maine biologists have proposed increasing the number of available moose permits this year by 11 percent over last year, up to 3,135.

With the order set to last through April 30, here’s what you can (and can’t) do while that is in place.

The crisp connection between bat and ball was one of the chief selling points for a Shirley company as it returned to spring training sites in Florida and Arizona to market their bats to major- and minor-league baseball players. By all accounts Dove Tail Bats was having its share of success as one of approximately 35 bat makers certified by Major League Baseball.

Warning that “more people will die,” Gov. Janet Mills on Tuesday ordered Mainers to stay home except to shop for necessities or to go to jobs deemed essential through April, putting Maine among a majority of states to take similar action to fight the coronavirus.

One additional new program available to people in the region who are self-isolating at home or anyone who is having trouble doing grocery shopping due to concerns about risk, illness or disability is called Community Pulling Together. This is a program funded partly with a small grant from The New England Grassroots Environment Fund COVID-19 response program awarded to The Commons Energy Collaborative.

Hospitals across Maine are steeling themselves for a possible spike in patients with the coronavirus by stocking up on equipment and freeing up beds and workers. But while those efforts are critical from a public health perspective, they could make it harder in the long run for rural hospitals to sustain their current operations when many of them are already struggling to pay the bills. 

State courts in Maine will again cut back the hours they are open to the public Monday to help limit the community transmission of COVID-19, the illness caused by the new coronavirus.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland announced March 27 that Holy Week and Easter services will be online and not open to the public due to the regulations currently in place in Maine as a result of the COVID-19 crisis.