A series of changes at the Webster County Sheriff’s Department were put into motion Tuesday as the promotion of Deputy Derek Christie to sergeant was approved by the Board of Supervisors.

Christie will begin his new duties on Monday.

He was hired by the Webster County Sheriff’s Department in March 2013. His promotion fills a vacancy left late last year by the retirement of Sgt. Jayson Heesch.

Sheriff Jim Stubbs praised Christie at Tuesday’s meeting.

“I think Derek will make an excellent sergeant,” he said, adding that there were two deputies eligible for the promotion.

“It was a tough, tough decision because they’re both very good and both very capable,” Stubbs said.

Christie’s promotion is part of a series of moves that Stubbs has been planning for more than a year, starting with the hiring of an additional deputy in 2018, increasing the department’s ranks to 17 sworn officers.

He had previously told the supervisors that the additional road deputy would then allow him to add another person to the investigations division.

“Amy Stringer will move to investigations, general crime,” Stubbs said Tuesday. “And Alex Winninger will move to the ICAC (Internet Crimes Against Children) unit.”

Winninger’s move will fill the investigative vacancy left by the departure of Detective Jason Bahr, who left the Sheriff’s Department in 2018 to take a job in the Council Bluffs area.

Stringer’s investigative position is the new position that Stubbs had said he wanted to create.

She will be the first female detective on the Webster County Sheriff’s Department.

Stubbs said everybody should be moved to their new positions by the end of the month.