JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — More than 100 Republican Missouri lawmakers are calling for a University of Missouri assistant professor to be fired in response to her videotaped clash with reporters during campus protests.

The group of lawmakers on Monday announced they sent a letter to the Board of Curators to oust assistant communications professor Melissa Click.

Click didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Monday. A university spokesman declined to comment, saying it’s a personnel matter.

Click garnered national attention after she confronted a student photographer. The photographer was filming after the university system’s president and the Columbia campus’ chancellor resigned amid protests over what some saw as indifference to racial issues.

The video of Click and another professor fanned debate about freedom of the press.

Some Republican lawmakers say she acted inappropriately.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Kansas City’s Country Club Plaza shopping and entertainment district has been sold for only the second time since it opened in 1923.

Highwoods Properties announced an agreement to sell the Country Club Plaza for $660 million to a joint venture between Taubman Centers and The Macerich Company.

The sale is expected to close Feb. 1. Taubman and Macerich will be 50/50 owners.

The Taubman company, based in Broomfield Hills, Michigan, owns and manages 23 shopping centers in the United States and Asia. Macerich is a real estate investment trust with interests in 50 shopping centers and malls throughout the United States.

The 55-acre shopping district includes 18 properties, both retail and office space.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Figures have dropped for a fifth straight month in a survey of supply managers in nine Midwest and Plains states, providing continuing evidence of a regional economic slowdown.

A report issued Monday says the overall Mid-American Business Conditions Index dropped to 39.6 in December from 40.7 in November, 41.9 in October, 47.7 in September and 49.6 in August.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss oversees the survey, and he again blames manufacturing losses linked to the strong dollar and economic weakness among trading partners.

The survey results are compiled into a collection of indexes ranging from zero to 100. Survey organizers say any score above 50 suggests economic growth. A score below that suggests decline.

The survey covers Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Department data show hundreds of incidents each year of the children of military service members being victims of sexual assault.

The abuse of military dependents is committed most often by male enlisted troops, according to the data provided exclusively to The Associated Press.

The figures offer greater insight into the sexual abuse of children committed by service members, a problem of uncertain scale due to a lack of transparency in the military’s legal proceedings. With more than 1 million military dependents, the number of cases appears statistically small. But for a profession that prides itself on honor and discipline, any episodes of abuse cast a pall.

CANTON, Kan. (AP) — A central Kansas farmer is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to anyone responsible for killing and mutilating one of his cows.

John Shearer tells KWCH-TV of Wichita that he was feeding his cattle on New Year’s Day in McPherson County when he found one of the cows dead, its eyes gone.

It’s murky how the animal was killed. Shearer says the family’s veterinarian did find an injection mark on the cow’s neck, though it’s not unclear whether that was from a previous vaccination.

The cow’s death came roughly two weeks after a farmer in Harvey County found one of his bulls dead, its sex organs removed.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — An interfaith organization is calling on Kansas City police to address police shootings.

The Kansas City Star compiled a database and determined that police had been involved 47 shootings since 2005.

The newspaper found that Kansas City ranked third per capita behind St. Louis and Cleveland in fatal police shootings. Nearly 60 percent of those killed were black, although police say race is not a factor in the use of deadly force.

Rabbi Doug Alpert of Congregation Kol Ami called the numbers “very disturbing.”

Alpert is head of the criminal justice task force for More2, a Kansas City interfaith social justice organization. He said Kansas City may need a civilian monitoring committee to look at police shootings or some involvement from the Department of Justice.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Officials in southwest Missouri want federal officials to help buy out property owners in a flood-prone area.

At issue is flooding along the Spring River, which was among the waterways to overflow after recent heavy rains. Last week, notices were posted on 20 homes warning that no rebuilding will be allowed until Jasper County assesses the property.

Presiding Jasper County Commissioner John Bartosh says the county would like to buy the land, raze the buildings or move mobile homes, and use the land as a park. The Joplin Globe reports that the county unsuccessfully sought funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to help cover buyout costs after 2007 flooding.

But Bartosh says the recent flooding was worse, with water getting up to the eaves in the houses.

JOPLIN, Mo. (AP) — A southwestern Missouri murder defendant has been ordered to stand trial on charges that he sexually abused a girl.

The Joplin Globe reports that 33-year-old TerryRay Lynn Riggle has waived his right to a preliminary hearing in Jasper County. That’s where he’s charged with two counts of first-degree statutory sodomy and a single count of first-degree statutory rape.

Prosecutors allege that Riggle abused the girl when she was 7 years old in Carterville. The girl is now 9.

Riggle and his girlfriend also are charged with first-degree murder in the death of her husband, Jonny Slater.

Slater had been missing since September 2014 before his body was found in June in an old mine shaft near Carterville.

Riggle has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — A southwest Missouri woman has pleaded guilty to hiring someone to kill her sister.

In a plea entered Monday, Leta Faye Douglas, of Houston, admitted she agreed to pay another person $2,000 to kill her sister. The other person she contacted was an undercover law enforcement officer.

Court documents indicate Douglas’ ex-husband contacted authorities after she called him in January 2015 asking for help with the plot. The husband said Douglas’ parents were in a home for the elderly and her sister was in charge of their finances. He believed she wanted access to her parents’ estate.

Douglas met with the undercover agent in Houston in February 2015 and gave him a map of her sister’s home and the $2,000. She was arrested a few days later.

JOPLIN, Mo. (AP) — Missouri regulators will hold public hearings in southwestern Missouri’s Joplin and other cities perhaps affected by rate increases sought by utility Missouri American Water.

The Joplin Globe reports that the Missouri Public Service Commission will hold a meeting at 5:30 p.m. January 26th at Missouri Southern State University in Joplin. Other sessions will be in Jefferson City, Branson, Warrensburg, St. Joseph, St. Louis County and in other areas served by Missouri American.

Missouri American filed water and sewer rate cases last July with the commission seeking to increase annual operating revenues by roughly $51 million statewide.

Under the new rate proposals, some communities will see rates increase while others will see decreases.