DNR director to leave job before Nixon starts

JOPLIN, Mo. — Doyle Childers, director of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources for the past four years, says he won't continue to serve under governor-elect Jay Nixon. He says he'll resign by the time Nixon becomes governor. Childers says his time at the department was consumed by fights with Nixon over a proposal to tear down the Katy Trail railroad bridge that crosses the Missouri River near Boonville, Mo., and the cleanup of Johnson Shut-ins State Park after a dam holding back the Taum Sauk Reservoir burst in Southeast Missouri. He said it's "no secret" he and Nixon had been at odds. Oren Shur, a spokesman for Nixon, declined to comment.

— From wire reports