(AP) – Gov. Jay Nixon is proposing an additional $4.5 million for a program that offers customized worker training for companies that create or retain jobs in Missouri.

The governor said Thursday the funding boost would go to Missouri Works Training. Nixon will release his budget recommendations next week for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

Nixon’s office says Missouri Works Training last year helped train more than 35,000 workers at 339 companies statewide.

Nixon says skilled employees are important for the economy and that his administration has focused on strengthening the state’s workforce.

(AP) Two Turkish citizens face federal smuggling charges for allegedly shipping tainted cancer treatment prescription drugs from Turkey and other foreign countries into Missouri.

Federal prosecutors say OzKan Semizoglu and Sabahaddin Akman smuggled three shipments from Turkey to Chesterfield.

Each faces one felony count of conspiracy to smuggle merchandise into the United States and three counts of smuggling. Online court records did not list an attorney for either defendant.

Rep. Sam Graves commented on the Senate Intelligence Committee on Benghazi today.  He wrote on his facebook page,

“The Senate Intelligence Committee has produced a report on #Benghazi that finds in the lead-up to the attack, there was “ample strategic warning that the security situation in Libya was deteriorating and that facilities and personnel were at risk in Benghazi.” It also shows that the administration was less than forthcoming in providing critical documents to the committee as it reviewed this preventable tragedy. This is why it is so important that we continue to work on getting to the bottom of this.”
If you would like to read the report, it is available here:http://www.intelligence.senate.gov/benghazi2014/benghazi.pdf

(AP) — A judge has granted a request to close an evidentiary hearing in the case of an eastern Kansas man accused of killing three adults and a child in rural Ottawa last year.

Franklin County District Judge Thomas Sachse on Thursday granted the state’s motion to close the Feb. 13 hearing for Kyle T. Flack, who is charged with capital murder.

Attorneys for Flack did not object to the state’s request.

Flack is charged with capital murder, first-degree murder, rape and criminal possession of a firearm in the deaths last May Andrew Adam Stout, Steven Eugene White, Kaylie Kathleen Bailey, and Bailey’s 18-month-old daughter, Lana-Leigh.

Flack’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for March 11.

(AP) – Two state employees lost their jobs after a disabled student was left on a school bus for nearly six hours.

Officials with the Lakeview Woods State School in Lee’s Summit say the school is using new procedures to prevent a similar problem in the future.

School administrator Diane Odegard says the two people worked at the school and also were a bus driver and bus monitor for the bus company, First Student.

The Kansas City Star reports the student, who is in a wheelchair and nonverbal, was left on the bus when it arrived at school at 8:45 a.m. on Jan. 10. She was discovered about 2:30 p.m.

When she was found, the school called her family and reported itself to the state’s child abuse and prevention hotline.

(AP) – Former state Sen. Ryan McKenna has won Senate confirmation as director of Missouri’s labor department.

Senators approved McKenna’s appointment Thursday without any discussion.

McKenna resigned from the Senate in December after Gov. Jay Nixon appointed him as head of the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. The Democrat from Jefferson County began the new job last month but needed Senate confirmation to remain in the post.

Republican state House member Dennis Fowler was appointed to the state parole board on the same day as McKenna. But senators have taken no action on his nomination.

Senate President Pro Tem Tom Dempsey said Thursday that Fowler doesn’t have enough support. Some Republican senators are upset that Fowler voted to sustain Nixon’s veto of an income tax cut last year.

(AP) — Supporters and critics of Missouri tax cut plans both are pointing to the results of recent tax cuts in Kansas.

Several business groups testified during a Senate committee hearing Thursday that Missouri must cut taxes to discourage employers in the Kansas City area from moving across the state line.

But opponents said Kansas revenues and education funding have suffered as a result of its tax cuts.

The Senate panel considered three proposals Thursday. One would cut taxes only on business income. Another would reduce Missouri’s individual income tax rate. A third bill would phase in tax cuts for both businesses and individuals. No vote was taken.

Republican legislative leaders have made an income tax cut a priority this year after Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon vetoed last year’s bill.