50 ★ States

News from across the USA

ALABAMA Montgomery: Gov. Kay Ivey is not ready to issue a shelter-inplace order as other governors have, a spokeswoman said Wednesday, arguing the state has taken aggressive action to curb the spread of the new coronavirus.

ALASKA Juneau: The state accused an Anchorage man of buying respirators and selling them at “unconscionable prices” online to profit off coronavirus concerns. The complaint against Juan Lyle Aune alleged violations of a law barring unfair trade and commerce practices. It seeks financial penalties.

ARIZONA Phoenix: Some shooting ranges in metro Phoenix are closing to the public or restricting hours in response to the coronavirus pandemic. The Arizona Game and Fish Department announced that Ben Avery Shooting Facility in north Phoenix is closed to the public until further notice.

ARKANSAS Little Rock: The Buffalo National River was temporarily closed Thursday because of coronavirus concerns. The National Park Service said the closure takes effect immediately and includes the river, trails, campgrounds and open spaces.

CALIFORNIA Los Angeles: A British man accused of smuggling a phony coronavirus cure into the United States was charged with a federal crime, prosecutors said.

COLORADO Colorado: In the past two weeks, Northern Colorado shelters and rescue groups have seen dramatic spikes in adoption and foster applications. As adoptions soar during the coronavirus epidemic, fewer pets are being surrendered to the Larimer Humane Society, said Tylor Starr, marketing and community outreach program manager.

CONNECTICUT Hartford: Two members of the Connecticut National Guard are among the latest state residents to test positive for COVID-19.

DELAWARE Wilmington: Trout fishing season started Tuesday, instead of the traditional first Saturday in April, “to help minimize crowds and accommodate responsible outdoor recreation during the current coronavirus (COVID-19) period,” the state Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control said.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA Washington: Mayor Muriel Bowser said a COVID-19 testing site opens Friday at United Medical Center, WUSA-TV reported.

FLORIDA Melbourne: The Brevard Zoo is welcoming a baby male giraffe, which was born on Sunday. The calf weighed 125 pounds and was 6-feet tall at birth.

GEORGIA Marietta: A kitten stuck on a roof in the cold was saved by firefighters. The 6-week-old kitten was nursed back to health Wednesday after her rescue, Cobb County Fire and Emergency Services said.

HAWAII Honolulu: A school has distributed laptops to students who need the computers to take part in online education during the coronavirus outbreak.

IDAHO Boise: U.S. officials are using the coronavirus pandemic to force through a long-delayed livestock grazing allotment decision in critical sage grouse habitat for a powerful agribusiness, an environmental group claimed.

ILLINOIS Carbondale: Southern Illinois University has suspended the Delta Chi fraternity for violating the chancellor’s order banning in-person activities to slow the spread of COVID-19, officials said.

INDIANA Indianapolis: An April Fools’ Day prank making the rounds on social media suggested that Indiana students will have to repeat their current grade because of the coronavirus crisis. The joke, created by prank websites that can be used to generate social media posts that resemble real news stories, used Gov. Eric Holcomb’s image and claimed that he announced the move during a news conference. That did not happen.

KANSAS Topeka: The state expects an influx of coronavirus tests in the coming weeks that should help with efforts to bring the pandemic under control, the state’s top health official said.

KENTUCKY Frankfort: The Kentucky National Guard already has been posted at local hospitals, but they soon will be at food banks amid the coronavirus pandemic.

LOUISIANA Shreveport: Gov. John Bel Edwards reported a “jarring” uptick in coronavirus cases Thursday, though the state health department’s top COVID-19 expert said the spike is the result of a logjam of test results finally released to the state.

MAINE Portland: Unemployment claims in Maine have reached a new high, surpassing a previous record attributed to the coronavirus outbreak.

MARYLAND Salisbury: In the span of a week, Hardwire went from building armor to help protect soldiers from improvised explosives to trying to protecting health care workers from an enemy invisible to the naked eye.

MASSACHUSETTS Boston: The New England Patriots private team plane was expected to return to Boston from China on Thursday carrying more than 1 million masks crucial to health care providers fighting to control the spread of the new coronavirus.

MICHIGAN Lansing: Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Thursday urged state lawmakers not to come to the Capitol on Tuesday, as planned, saying it is too dangerous to convene a session during the coronavirus pandemic. But she later clarified her remarks through a spokeswoman, saying lawmakers should convene briefly and in a safe manner to extend her emergency and disaster orders, and then return to their districts.

MINNESOTA St. Paul: Gov. Tim Walz said he will deliver his postponed State of the State address at 7 p.m. Sunday, and added he’s looking forward to speaking directly to Minnesotans during this uncertain time.

MISSISSIPPI Jackson: A nonpartisan special election to fill a state House seat is being delayed by two months because of concerns about the new coronavirus. Gov. Tate Reeves announced Thursday that June 23 is the new date for the election in District 88 in parts of Jasper and Jones counties. If a runoff is needed, it will be July 14.

MISSOURI Kansas City: Smaller local governments are issuing stayat-home orders to slow the spread of the new coronavirus in Missouri, where the governor hasn’t issued a statewide order.

MONTANA Great Falls: Cascade County commissioners voted 2-1 to conduct an all-mail ballot election for the June 2 primary to reduce the chances of elderly election judges, county employees and voters from getting the new coronavirus.

NEBRASKA Lincoln: The state saw another record-setting surge in unemployment claims last week as the new coronavirus forced more businesses to close and lay off workers, according to new data released Thursday.

NEVADA Las Vegas: More than 20,000 people registered to vote in March, but the rate of people signing up to vote slowed at the end of the month, when state Department of Motor Vehicles offices closed because of the coronavirus epidemic, according to Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske.

NEW HAMPSHIRE Concord: Some county jail inmates who were convicted or accused of nonviolent crimes have been released to help prevent the spread of the new coronavirus, state corrections officials said.

NEW JERSEY Secaucus: Gov. Phil Murphy toured a 250-bed field hospital at the Meadowlands Exposition Center in Secaucus.The hospital is scheduled to field non-coronavirus cases. It’s one of four field hospitals that are supposed to open in New Jersey. There will be two 250-bed facilities in Edison, with the fourth a 250-bed field hospital in Atlantic City.

NEW MEXICO Doña Ana: Officials with the Doña Ana County Detention Center reported that there are no cases of COVID-19 at the facility, and that they have initiated a quarantine for new detainees.

NEW YORK New York City: Veterinarians are answering the call to give up their ventilators to help fight the new coronavirus in humans. With city hospitals facing a ventilator shortage as coronavirus cases multiply, Mayor Bill De Blasio on Tuesday urged vets, plastic surgeons and others who might have the potentially life-saving equipment to lend it for the duration of the crisis.

NORTH CAROLINA Tarboro: A man has been arrested after deputies, who were responding to a call about a shooting, found more than 70 people at a barn, a sheriff’s office said, violating Gov. Roy Cooper’s order limiting gatherings.

NORTH DAKOTA Bismarck: One of the state’s largest oil producers filed for bankruptcy Wednesday, citing the coronavirus pandemic on top of plunging oil prices. Gov. Doug Burgum said he expected more might follow and would “create real pressure on state budgets.”

OHIO Columbus: Ohioans are confronted with an additional four weeks in isolation as Gov. Mike DeWine extended the state’s stayat-home order Thursday to undercut the coming peak of coronavirus cases. The order issued by state health director Dr. Amy Acton will continue stay-at-home precautions until May 1.

OKLAHOMA Oklahoma City: Gov. Kevin Stitt called Thursday for a special session of the Legislature as part of his declaration of a health emergency in all 77 counties.

OREGON Salem: A doctor at a veterans home in Oregon used a malaria drug to treat eight patients there for the new coronavirus, but said a state rule enacted last month would prevent him from treating any more veterans there. After pushback against the Oregon Board of Pharmacy’s March 25 rule, the board amended it on Wednesday to allow the drug to be used not only in hospitals for confirmed COVID-19 cases, but also long-term care facilities like the Oregon Veterans’ Home in Lebanon.

PENNSYLVANIA Harrisburg: As expected, demand far exceeded the capacity of Pennsylvania’s system of state-owned liquor stores to process online orders as sales resumed Wednesday. Brick-and-mortar liquor stores are closed because of the coronavirus pandemic, but nearly 278,000 people tried to place orders on the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board website during the first day of digital sales.

RHODE ISLAND Providence: A coalition of labor unions and social justice organizations in Rhode Island is calling on state leaders to pass their own coronavirus relief package to help workers and the newly unemployed.

SOUTH CAROLINA Columba: Public health officials are creating a statewide database of addresses of known positive COVID-19 cases, a secure tool only made available to first responders who have argued the information could help protect them.

SOUTH DAKOTA Eagle Butte: The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe said it is setting up checkpoints on roads going into tribal land on Thursday to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.

TENNESSEE Memphis: As more people get sick from the new coronavirus in Tennessee, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has evaluated sites in the Memphis area to convert to medical care facilities to ease the burden on hospitals facing an incoming wave of patients.

TEXAS Laredo: Residents are being required to wear something that covers their nose and mouth when they’re out in public during the coronavirus pandemic – or face a fine of up to $1,000.

UTAH Salt Lake City: As the number of coronavirus cases and deaths grew in Utah, the governor announced a freeze on evictions Wednesday and advocates demanded more inmates be released to prevent the spread in jails and prisons.

VERMONT Burlington: Members of Chittenden County’s largest emergency response agencies have so far remained mostly healthy despite the spread of the new coronavirus in Vermont.

VIRGINIA Richmond: A long-term care facility with one of the nation’s worst-known coronavirus outbreaks said Thursday that testing conducted on all residents had more than doubled the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 to nearly 100 as the number of fatalities increased to 16.

WASHINGTON Seattle: Federal authorities have proposed a $611,000 fine for a Seattle-area nursing home connected to at least 40 coronavirus deaths.

WEST VIRGINIA Charleston: The state’s attorney general on Thursday said a ban on elective medical procedures during the coronavirus pandemic will reduce abortions but will be upheld in an eventual legal challenge.

WISCONSIN Milwaukee: The United States’ top infectious disease specialist is getting his own bobblehead. The creation from the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum in Milwaukee features Dr. Anthony Fauci. The museum will plans to donate $5 from every $25 Fauci bobblehead that’s sold to the American Hospital Association in support of that group’s effort to get masks and other personal protective equipment for health care workers.

WYOMING Casper: Wyoming courts are extending measures to discourage spread of the coronavirus by another seven weeks.