A spike in COVID intensity will likely mean a corresponding spike in COVID case counts and percent positivity in the near future, according to Albany County’s health department.

Wesley Hale, who uses medical marijuana to ease his pain, told the Guilderland Town Board on Tuesday, “You could go out in Guilderland in the black market and you could get marijuana.” But, he said, you wouldn’t know if it was safe — it could be laced with fentanyl.

BETHLEHEM — The family of Meghan Marohn, the Delmar woman who has been missing since March 26, has set up a website offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to her safe return.

Currently, just 36 percent of children ages 5 to 11 have been fully vaccinated while 73 percent of adolescents aged 12 to 17 have, according to state figures.

Jacqulyn Vandenburg said she knows how important it is to pull from “a big bank of people” and so she creates that for the students and community at Lynnwood. “It was important in my life so I want to try to foster that here,” said Vandenburg.

As health departments in New York State and elsewhere are no longer doing the contact tracing they did for most of the first two years of the pandemic, the federal government has launched a website to help Americans figure out, as individuals, how to deal with COVID-19. The “toolkit” has links to find test-to-treat locations, vaccine sites, and how to order masks and self-administered tests.

GUILDERLAND — Bill Batt is a man of ideas — big ideas.

Right now, he’s organizing the annual Council of Georgist Organizations conference to be held this year in Albany, from July 15 to 17.

The district’s committee on diversity, equity, and inclusion voted to move forward a resolution to the school board to change Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day, which will be discussed with public comment at a later date. The committee is also working on a land-acknowledgement declaration, which is taking time to research. “They want it to be authentic, to see whose land we’re on,” said board member Kim Blasiak.

“New variants, such as the B.A.2 variant, continue to arise,” said Governor Kathy Hochul, “and without additional federal funds the proven tools we have come to rely on, most notably vaccines and boosters, may not be readily available for all New Yorkers.”

Nominations to the registry must be sponsored by an elected state official. Each elected official may nominate two businesses for inclusion per term.