Ballots are expected to be mailed Wednesday and arrive in Big Island mailboxes shortly after that as the nation counts down to the Nov. 8 general election.

Tickets for the 60th Annual Merrie Monarch Festival will go on sale Dec. 1.

A non-response from government officials to emails and telephone calls isn’t necessarily a violation of the ethics code, the county Board of Ethics said Wednesday in denying a resident’s call to penalize 14 top officials for ignoring his warnings about what he saw as the danger of face masks and vaccines during the coronavirus pandemic.

Kona Community Hospital has temporarily stopped accepting new patients in its medical oncology and chemotherapy infusion clinics, forcing those needing care to travel to Waimea, Hilo or Honolulu for treatment.

A pair of popular North Kona beach parks will close starting Oct. 31 for up to eight months for an array of improvements.

The agency charged with protecting the state’s natural resources has approved an environmental impact statement supporting the harvesting of tropical fish for the aquarium industry despite ongoing litigation over the issue.

The last month of the dry season was emphatically so for the windward Big Island, and the National Weather Service’s only official rain gauge to measure rainfall in double-digits in September was in Kona’s coffee belt, which experiences its rainy season in the summer.

HONOLULU — Gov. David Ige signed an executive order Tuesday that aims to prevent other states from punishing their residents who get an abortion in the islands and stop other states from sanctioning local doctors and nurses who provide such care.