Eliot police chief named Maine Chief of the Year for mental health advocacy: 'We've done a lot'

ELIOT, Maine — For his work in creating a crisis intervention team and spotlighting officer wellness, Elliott Moya, the town’s police chief, has been named the state's Chief of the Year by the Maine Association of Police.

Nominated by his department peers, Moya received the award named for David W. Pickering during an annual banquet in late January. With the previous banquet canceled due to COVID-19, Moya was named Chief of the Year in addition to Paul Fenton, chief of the Cape Elizabeth Police Department.

Moya said the award belongs less to himself and more to the men and women of the town’s police force, a department with a $1.8 million budget in which there are currently only eight officers.

“It completely caught me off guard. I am absolutely the guy that’s like, ‘I don’t deserve this.’ We’re here, we work and it is what it is,” Moya said. “But in a way, it’s kind of cool because I’m like, ‘OK, do I deserve this?’ And then you think, ‘Well, what have we done?’ And when I think about it, for such a small department, we have a good crew here. We’ve done a lot.”

Moya, a former member of the Air Force Reserve who was born in Brooklyn, began his policing career in the town department as a patrolman in 2007. Three years later, he was promoted to detective, and he later became a department lieutenant before being sworn in as chief in May 2016.

“As humble as I want to be, sure I’m the guy who gets named, but it’s these guys that make me look good,” he said of Eliot’s police personnel. “They’re the ones that really do the work.”

Moya's officers made case for him

Eliot police Sgt. Ronald Lund and other town officers nominated Moya for the award in late 2022. In their official nomination letter to the Maine Association of Police, Lund wrote that Moya created and supervised a crisis intervention team where responding officers reported all mental health calls and conducted follow-up checks on people and their families.

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Moya, the letter continued, partnered with the National Alliance on Mental Illness Maine and Sweetster Mobile Crisis Interventions, representatives of which have joined Eliot police on ride-alongs. Last year, the Eliot Police Department partnered with the York County Community Action Corporation and police from Kittery and York to hire a case worker focused on residents in the three municipalities.

Recently certified as a peer support administrator, Moya additionally hosted a Law Enforcement Wellness and Resilience Symposium for New England police in March 2022, which drew 125 officers. Moya was also credited for implementing wellness check-ins for town police with a mental health expert.

“It’s rewarding for us that we were able to recognize him for the great work that we’ve been doing,” Lund said. “One of the biggest things that the chief did when he took over was rewrite the mission statement and our core values, and those are respect, integrity, fairness, leadership and empathy. He’s really instilled that in us.”

Moya's work praised by town and state leaders

Town Manager Michael Sullivan, who has been at the helm of the town for close to a year-and-a-half, has worked with larger police departments in his municipal career.

When he came to Eliot from South Hadley, Massachusetts, where he was town administrator, Sullivan was pleasantly surprised to see residents were on a first-name basis with the town’s small police roster, and the department was ingrained in the community.

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Sullivan further noted that because of Moya’s leadership, Eliot’s police officers care deeply for each other and the work they undertake.

“That idea of thoughtfulness permeates throughout the department. You care about them and they care about each other. It’s really impressive,” he said.

The David W. Pickering Chief’s Award is bestowed upon a police chief from one of 53 association member municipalities who has supported and contributed to the mission of the Maine Association of Police.

“Elliott is truly a man apart from a lot of other leaders in the police profession,” said the association’s executive director, Paul Gaspar, who added selecting Moya for the honor was a no-brainer.

“I truly think of him as a friend and a brother, and I couldn’t think of a more deserving person,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Eliot Police Chief Elliott Moya named Maine Chief of the Year