Today: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after 4pm. Sunny, with a high near 95. Calm wind becoming north northwest around 5 mph in the afternoon.
Tonight: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms before 10pm. Partly cloudy, with a low around 59. North wind around 6 mph becoming calm after midnight.
Friday: Sunny, with a high near 96. Light east wind becoming south southeast 6 to 11 mph in the morning.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson is calling on the House of Representatives to pass the federal farm bill, which contains wildfire 
and drought aid.
Nelson, Nebraska’s lone congressional Democrat, accused the House of playing politics by delaying debate on the bill as farmers and ranchers struggle through record drought. Nebraska and other states have also struggling to control wildfires in tinder-dry conditions.
Nelson says the farm bill includes provisions for financial relief for those suffering from drought and wildfires and would give “Nebraskans a bit of breathing room against natural disasters that often strike without warning.”
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Eight more Nebraska counties have been added to a national list of those eligible for a streamlined drought relief 
process.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture says it streamlined the process as crops in many states burn up in the widest drought in nearly 25 years.
Nearly 1,370 counties nationwide now will automatically qualify for disaster assistance if they’re in a severe drought for at least eight weeks or were in extreme drought this growing season.
The eight new Nebraska counties on the list are Boone, Custer, Greeley, Howard, Merrick, Nance, Sherman and Valley. Already on the list were Banner, Chase, Dawson, Dundy, Franklin, Frontier, Furnas, Gosper, Harlan, Hayes, Hitchcock, Kimball, Lincoln, Perkins, Phelps and Red Willow.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Police say they’ve arrested a 25-year-old Omaha man on accusations that he fatally shot a southeast Omaha man and his two sons.
Timothy J. Britt was arrested Wednesday and charged with three counts of first-degree murder and three related firearms charges.
He’s accused of shooting 44-year-old Miguel Avalos, 18-year-old Miguel Avalos Jr. and his 16-year-old brother, Jose Avalos, on July 9.
Police have said someone broke into the Avalos home and opened fire. Other family members in the home escaped injury.
Britt is the third person to be arrested in the case. Others are 33-year-old Anthony Davis, of Omaha, and 27-year-old Tiaotta Clairday, of Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Britt’s case did not yet appear in online courts records.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Omaha police have a good lead in the search for a hit and run driver — his vehicle’s license plate.
A driver crashed into a parked sport utility vehicle early Wednesday, then drove away. The crash left the parked a Ford Escape on its side.
Officers who responded about 1 a.m. found a license plate along with parts of a Jeep’s bumper.
Police were still searching for the Jeep’s driver Wednesday.
DENVER (AP) — The University of Colorado, Denver confirms it received a suspicious package on campus that it turned over to authorities.
In a statement Wednesday, the university wouldn’t confirm the package’s contents or the sender.
Multiple news outlets have reported that the former neuroscience graduate student accused of killing 12 people in a Colorado movie theater sent a notebook to the university containing scribblings of stick figures being shot.
The university said Wednesday that the package was immediately investigated and turned over to authorities within hours of its delivery Monday.
Citing unnamed law enforcement sources, Fox News’ website reported that James Holmes sent the notebook in a package that had sat unopened since July 12.
In the statement, the university disputed that it received the package on July 12 but did not elaborate.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A southern Nebraska natural resources district has banned lawn watering and car washing as water demand peaks
in the drought.
Little Blue Natural Resources District says its public water system is in an emergency situation because pumps can’t keep up with demand and water towers can’t be filled.
The district says all nonessential water use should be curtailed.
The water project serves more than 280 tower and business hookups in eastern Thayer County and west and central Jefferson County, including the villages of Gilead and Gladstone.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — After days of scorching heat and strong winds, a shift in the weather is helping firefighters battle wildfires burning in north-central Nebraska along the scenic Niobrara River.
Nebraska Emergency Management Agency spokesman Mike Wight says an overnight cold front saw temperatures drop, humidity increase and winds die down in the area on Wednesday.
Wight says the biggest help to firefighters might be a shift in the wind, which had been coming from the south and pushing flames into trees and other growth along stream beds. With the wind now coming from the northwest, it’s helping keep the fire out of those channels.
Wight says firefighters will learn early Thursday whether they were able to keep the fires, which have burned about 113 square miles altogether.
CHADRON, Neb. (AP) — Authorities have tentatively identified the human remains found in northwest Nebraska’s Dawes County.
County Attorney Vance Haug (howg) says a positive identification is pending dental records or DNA tests. Consequently, the name of the person won’t be released.
A rancher found the remains on his property July 16 while moving cattle near the South Dakota line.
The cause of the person’s death has not been determined.
A stellar outing from Jeff Francis and Marco Scutaro’s big night at the plate helped the Colorado Rockies salvage a game from their trip to Arizona. The Rockies knocked off the Diamondbacks 4-2 last night. Francis worked into the seventh inning, allowing just two runs on five hits. Adam Ottavino and Matt Belisle worked perfect relief in the seventh and eighth, and Rafael Betancourt struck out two in the ninth for his seventeenth save of the season. Scutaro opened the scoring with a sacrifice fly in the first inning, and his two-run double in the third gave the Rockies a 3-1 lead. Wilin Rosario clouted a solo home run, his sixteenth of the season, in the fourth. The Rockies are off today as they return home following a 2-4 road trip. They’ll open a three-game series against the Cincinnati Reds tomorrow night at Coors Field.
