(AP) – Fire investigators are trying to determine what caused a fire that killed one person and seriously injured another in southwest Missouri.

Webster County fire officials say the blaze broke out Sunday afternoon in a rural area south of Diggins.

One of the residents escaped but suffered severe burns. Another person was unable to escape and perished in the fire.

Three firefighters suffered minor injuries when oxygen tanks inside the house exploded during the fire.

Authorities say the fire likely started in the front of the home but a cause is still unknown.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Last year was tied for the fourth warmest year on record around the world.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Tuesday released its global temperature figures for 2013. The average world temperature was 58.12 degrees tying with 2003 for the fourth warmest since 1880.

NASA, which calculates records in a different manner, said Tuesday that 2013 was the seventh warmest on record, with an average temperature of 58.3 degrees.

Both agencies said nine of the 10th warmest years on record have happened in the 21st century. The hottest year was 2010.

A global insurance firm says there were 41 billion-dollar weather disasters last year. Unlike 2012, most of the heat and disasters were outside the United States.

(AP) — Some state agencies are looking to the University of Kansas Medical Center to train more psychiatrists to address a widespread shortage, but doing so will be neither cheap nor easy.

Shawn Sullivan, secretary of the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services, says a consultant determined that his agency needs more than three extra psychiatrists to meet its service needs.

Sullivan says his department and other state agencies can meet mental health needs by telemedicine for now, but in the long run there needs to be more psychiatrists coming out of Medical Center.

William Gabrielli is chairman of the center’s psychiatry department. He says the school currently has about 10 general psychiatry residencies for each year’s class, and each costs the center $100,000.

(AP) — A Missouri House panel has canceled a hearing that was to look into concerns about the state’s execution procedures.

Committee Chairman Jay Barnes says he called off Tuesday’s hearing after learning that Department of Corrections Director George Lombardi was not going to attend it.

It wasn’t immediately clear why Lombardi wasn’t going to be there.

Barnes says he didn’t want a one-sided hearing and hopes to reschedule at a later date.

The House Government Oversight and Accountability Committee was to look into concerns that the department is obtaining its execution drug from a compounding pharmacy in Oklahoma that’s not licensed in Missouri.

Barnes says he also wants to examine how the department determines that all legal appeals are exhausted before carrying out executions.

Rich Pottorff, Doane chief economist & Washington analyst

Negotiators claim to be very close to a final framework, but some issues remain challenging.

Other farm bill issues are also still under negotiation. One of those issues is payment limits. Both the House and Senate passed proposals including language capping the amount of money individual farmers could receive, but it is not clear that those limits will be in the final bill – assuming we eventually get a final bill!

The King amendment that would prevent California from blocking imports of eggs that were not produced according to that state’s regulations is still unresolved, as is the final determination about catfish inspections.

There are plenty of reasons for Congress to pass a new farm bill.

One is that Brazil is again threatening to impose retaliatory tariffs on about 100 U.S. products with values of up to $850 million if cotton polices aren’t changed to bring them into compliance with WTO rulings. Brazil has postponed imposition of these tariffs in recent years with the understanding that Congress would bring U.S. policies into compliance. But they’re getting impatient.

The House has approved the $1.012 trillion spending bill for fiscal 2014 and the Senate is expected to act on it before the end of the week.

The continuing resolution expired at the end of the day Wednesday, but Congress passed a 3-day bill to give the Senate time to vote on the new bill.

The bill for this fiscal year includes $20.9 billion in discretionary funding for the Agriculture Department. This is an increase of $350 million over the funding level for fiscal 2013. The bill also includes $8.2 billion for the EPA, up $299 million from the 2013 level.

Congress added language to the omnibus spending bill that makes it clear the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) does not have the authority to regulate farms with fewer than 10 employees. Since 2011, OSHA has been inspecting grain bins on small farms and the agency says these inspections saved lives. But critics successfully argued regulatory overkill. Example: A farm in Nebraska faced fines totaling $132,000 after OSHA inspected the grain bins!

Other news from Washington:

• The U.S. has notified the World Trade Organization that it spent $4.7 billion on amber box (trade-distorting) farm subsidies in 2011, 13 percent more than in 2010 but still well under the $19.1 billion cap on U.S. amber box subsidies under WTO rules. The breakout: Subsidies for dairy accounted for $3.2 billion; subsidies for sugar totaled $1.4 billion in the form of market price support. The U.S. spent $125 billion on green box (non-trade distorting) subsidies in 2011 – with most of that going to the food stamp program.
• What Congress does with the Country of Origin Labeling issue also has potential international trade implications. President Obama will attend a NAFTA summit in February and the COOL issue will be high on the agenda. Governments in Canada and Mexico are criticizing the rules that USDA put in place last fall and the future of the COOL regulations are part of the ongoing farm bill debate in Congress. If the rules aren’t changed they will almost certainly be challenged at the WTO.

Andy Tompkins, president and CEO of the Kansas Board of Regents, announced the following work group of representatives to review the Kansas Board of Regent’s recently adopted policy regarding the improper use of social media.

Those named to the committee include: 

Emporia State University
Kevin Johnson (co-chair), general counsel
Max McCoy, associate professor, English, modern languages and journalism department

Fort Hays State University
Kristin Rupp, Web content manager
Melissa J. Hunsicker Walburn, assistant professor, informatics department

Kansas State University
Julia Keen, associate professor, architectural engineering and construction science department, and president, K-State Faculty Senate
Jeff Morris, vice president for communications and marketing

Pittsburg State University
Browyn Conrad, professor, history, philosophy and social sciences department, and president, PSU-KNEA
Dacia Clark, senior administrative specialist, alumni and constituent relations, and president, Classified Senate

University of Kansas
Charles Epp (co-chair), professor, School of Public Affairs and Administration
Easan Selvan, associate director, information technology services

University of Kansas Medical Center
Mark Fisher, professor, biochemistry and molecular biology department

Wichita State University
Victoria Mosack, professor, School of Nursing, and president, Faculty Senate
Richard Muma, associate vice president for academic affairs

For more information, contact Breeze Richardson at 785-291-3969 or [email protected].

Information provided by Ksu.edu