After nine years on the air, Drew Sugars will no longer be the co-anchor of the Santa Maria-based KCOY nightly news with his wife, Nerissa. The change will take effect at the beginning of March.

Drew is going work for the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department, producing and editing the department's in-house monthly DVD called the "Sheriff's roundup," intended to keep everyone in the more than 700-person department connected.

He first started looking for another job, he said, after KCOY failed to contact him regarding the end of his contract in February of this year. Usually, stations approach anchors about six months before their contract expires, he said.

Jeffrey MacDougall, general manager of the station, said that there was no timetable involved in Drew's contract negotiation--the station just hadn't gotten around to it yet.

"Obviously Drew has made a significant contribution to the station," he said. "We're going to miss him."

Other KCOY employees have also left recently. MacDougall attributed the employee losses as normal turnover for a TV station.