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Dietz Assumes Command with Corps of Engineers by Staff East Oregonian, July 31, 2018

Lt. Col. Christian Dietz recently assumed command of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Walla Walla District.

A July 20 ceremony was held at the Marcus Whitman Hotel and Conference Center in downtown Walla Walla. The passing of the Corps' colors signify that the duties and authority of command are transferred to a new leader.

Alan Feistner, deputy district engineer for project management and chief of planning, programs and project management division, provided the colors to the outgoing commander, Lt. Col. Damon Delarosa, who then passed them to the ceremony's presiding official, Col. Torrey DiCiro, commander of the Corps' Northwestern Division, who then presented them to Dietz.

Dietz most recently served as the executive officer to the operations director, assistant chief of staff for Installation Management at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. Over the years, he has served in many locations, including Germany, been deployed to Iraq, at Camp Hovey, South Korea, and in 2016 he was assigned to the U.S. Military Training Mission in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as an advisor to the Royal Saudi Land Forces and the King Abdulaziz Military Academy.

In his new position, Dietz is responsible for planning, engineering, design, construction, operation and maintenance of hundreds of projects to support navigation, hydropower, flood risk reduction, environmental stewardship and recreation. He administers regulatory programs, supports national disaster recovery and response operations, and maintains eight federal dams across the Columbia and Snake River basins.

Dietz enlisted in the U.S. Army Reserve in 1995 as an intelligence analyst. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 2001, after graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point with a bachelor's degree in civil engineering. He earned a master's degrees in engineering management from the Missouri University of Science and Technology in 2005 and in environmental engineering from the University of California Los Angeles in 2011.

Dietz is married to Candice Dietz, and they have two children, Ella, 8, and Lincoln, 8 months.