To hear the governor's statement to reporters, click here.   The audio includes some beeps as reporters joined the conference call late, and heavy breathing because reporters didn't have their telephones muted.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Gov. Jay Nixon said Wednesday that the Department of Natural Resources mishandled water quality test results at Lake of the Ozarks last spring. Nixon also says DNR said a state park beach was closed for swimming in late May when it really wasn't.

In a telephone conference call from Branson with reporters from across the state, Nixon called the problems at DNR "abysmal failures." He announced an investigation into the department and suspended its director, Mark Templeton, without pay for two weeks.

"It's clear to me there are serious questions with institutional controls," Nixon said.

Nixon said he has been answering reporters' questions about E. coli bacteria at Lake of the Ozarks, and when the information was passed on to his office, for several weeks based on wrong information given to him by DNR. He said the Lake of the Ozarks State Park beaches were closed on June 5 even though water samples showed dangerously high levels of bacteria two weeks earlier, and even though DNR said the beaches were closed earlier.

Nixon said his reaction is "sheer disappointment and disgust" with DNR.

"Incidents like this should never happen," he said.

Nixon said the E. coli levels in the lake in May were five times higher than safe levels. He said that put swimmers at risk.

Nixon was in Branson for a speech to a governor's Tourism Conference. After making his statement to reporters, he left followup questions and answers to members of his staff.
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Here's a report from Chris Blank and David Lieb of The Associated Press:

Missouri's Department of Natural Resources failed to close a beach at the Lake of the Ozarks this year despite high bacteria levels that put swimmers' health at risk, Gov. Jay Nixon said Wednesday.

Nixon said he has placed department director Mark Templeton on unpaid administrative leave for two weeks, pending an internal investigation.

On a hastily called conference call with reporters, Nixon said he learned only recently that the beach had not been closed after water samples taken on May 18 and May 27 showed high levels of E. coli.

"This is quite simply unconscionable," Nixon said. "It is nothing short of an outrage, and my reaction is sheer disappointment and disgust."

The Democratic governor said the department had previously provided him with false information indicating that the beach at the popular tourist lake had been closed before the Memorial Day weekend that began Friday, May 22. He said he "unwittingly" passed that along to reporters.

Templeton, who was also on the conference call, said his suspension is appropriate and concurred that the failure to close the beach was "unconscionable." He said he does not believe there was any intent to mislead the public or the governor when he shared incorrect information from his staff indicating the beaches had been closed.

Nixon's administration has been under fire since July, when reporters revealed the Department of Natural Resources waited until late June to publicly release test results from a month earlier showing the high E. coli levels at the lake.

The governor's office initially said it did not learn of those test results until June 23, when it said it immediately directed the results to be released. The DNR's former communications director, however, told Senate investigators last week that she informed an aide to Nixon, Jeff Mazur, of the high bacteria levels on May 29.

Mazur confirmed that to reporters on Wednesday but said he did not share the information with others in the governor's office then because the department was still looking into the matter.