The City of Fort Stockton swore in Maribel Perkins as a Municipal Court Judge on Tuesday, Jan. 26 at the city’s regular city council meeting.

Perkins brings a wealth of experience to the position after serving as an officer for the Fort Stockton Police Department for the last 15 years.

“This will be a new chapter to your storied career with the City of Fort Stockton,” Fort Stockton Mayor Chris Alexander said before the swearing in. “You’ve been an awesome police officer!’

Perkins left the police department as the Lieutenant of the Criminal Investigation Division.

Fort Stockton Police Chief Robert Lujan, who was in attendance, said she will be dearly missed but is excited to see her get an opportunity as a judge.

“This will be a challenge for her and she’s going to do an exceptional job,” Lujan said. “I know that about her.”

Perkins will replace Joe Munoz, who was also a previous trooper for the Department of Public Safety.

City council appoints three new CVB board members

To conclude the city council meeting, board members appointed three new Fort Stockton Convention & Visitors Bureau board members to fulfill three-year terms.

Adam Gonzales, Heather Pass, and Vishal Chopra were selected for the terms with the latter two getting unanimous votes from all city council members.

Gonzales is the only newly appointed member to have previously served, doing so from 2005-2011.

The trio will replaced Louann Tovar, Renee Gaylord, and Junior Sena.

The appointment of the three new members comes after a motion at a previous meeting by city councilman, Ruben Falcon, at a previous meeting to have applicants re-apply with a more thorough application in place that specifically requested greater detail into their plans to increase tourism.

At Tuesday’s meeting, Falcon expanded his thoughts on the motion.

“The thinking behind it was, we have Keeping Fort Stockton Beautiful, we have a lot of boards. But EDC and CVB, those are money boards. EDC has requirement for their members;’ he said. “My motion was we need to see what the people interested in the board wanted to do to improve tourism in Fort Stockton. The hotel owners, gas station owners, restaurant owners, we want to know the city council is doing to appoint people to increase tourism and increase sales tax revenue’

Gonzales, Pass, and Chopra will join the seven-member board along with mayor Alexander, Sabrina Ruiz, Jordan Gonzales, and Vic Bhakta