Merge pull request#10502 from tvegas1/news-1.18.1-rc1NEWS: Update to 1.18.1-rc1 release

Merge pull request#10428 from tvegas1/news_1.18.0_releaseNEWS: Update to 1.18.0 for release

Merge pull request#10313 from tvegas1/news_1.18.0-rc1RELEASE: Updated NEWS for v1.18.0-rc1

Merge pull request#10365 from tvegas1/news_v1.18.0-rc2RELEASE: Mark NEWS for 1.18.0-rc2 as TBD for now

Merge pull request#10330 from tvegas1/news_1.18.rc1_tbdRELEASE: Mark NEWS for 1.18.0-rc1 as TBD for now

Merge pull request#9956 from shasson5/newsRELEASE: Update NEWS 1.17 GA

Merge pull request#9939 from shasson5/newsRELEASE: Updated NEWS 1.17 RC3

Merge pull request#9923 from shasson5/newsRELEASE: Update NEWS 1.17 RC2

Merge pull request#9879 from shasson5/authorsRELEASE: Updated AUTHORS list for v1.17

Merge pull request#9822 from shasson5/topic/news-1.16.0RELEASE: Update NEWS for 1.16 GA version