By Trina Kleist
When Eileen Moon’s daughter started working at the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office in 1990, she would tell everyone that the young woman someday would lead the agency. Nearly 30 years later, when voters elected Shannan Moon the first woman sheriff of Nevada County in 2018, her mom cried.
“If your parents are supportive, and they tell you every single day you can do whatever you want and succeed… That kind of support is a huge deal-maker for folks,” says Shannan Moon, now 52.
Born and raised in Nevada County, Moon was 22 when she started as a correctional officer in the agency’s dark, loud and cold jail at the back of the county courthouse in downtown Nevada City. “It was eye-opening,” Moon says.
Over the years, informed by her sense of this community’s fabric and history, she learned the power of listening to figure out how to solve problems. Her most valuable tools came to include communication, fairness and firmness. She journeyed through jobs that included court bailiff, detective, patrolling in the eastern county, partnering with canines on the narcotics team, and transporting inmates from the new jail to the courthouse. She came to see victims and their families, and inmates and their families, too, as people.
Yet, strong community connections also bring their burdens: Moon found herself occasionally arresting friends’ children, or worse, informing friends of a death. Raising her own family has helped her be both a better cop and a better boss, she says: Moon is step-mother to three young women ages 14 to 25, with her wife and local probation officer Amy Moon.
All those experiences shape Shannan Moon’s vision of her job. “It’s not just about the enforcement of law and the corrections function, but so many other services that we provide,” Moon says. She encourages the agency’s officers to see themselves as providing, first and foremost, a public service. With every contact they make with every person, no matter what the circumstance, she asks officers to intend their very best — then look for how they can improve.
“Our contact literally makes a difference in how safe (people) feel,” Moon adds. “It’s a part of our culture at the Sheriff’s Office that, when you’re providing that service, to think, who would you want to show up to take that report or to make that notification? And to be that person.”
Her vision of the office boils down to this, Moon says: “I care.”
Women Coming Up Can See Themselves
Her father, Jim Moon, had worked in local law enforcement for 29 years. So the particular form of service that law enforcement embodies was a part of her growing up. Yet despite mom’s encouragement, Moon didn’t see herself as a candidate for sheriff, she says. She calls herself a doer, organized, an implementer of plans rather than the one to say what needs to be done.
Furthermore, women typically seek to master needed skills before launching into something new, while men typically have more confidence in tackling a job they’ve never held, she observes. Nevertheless, when former Sheriff Keith Royal announced he would not seek re-election, and as people in the department discussed the possibilities, Moon came to a conclusion: “After sitting in all the positions… I just felt a personal responsibility to my organization,” she recalls. “They’ve given me all the training and all the experience. Why wouldn’t I run?”
Now, Moon is one of four women sheriffs in California’s 58 counties. Another 19 women police chiefs lead among the state’s 333 municipal police departments, according to the California Police Chiefs Association. Nationally, women made up more than 11 percent of law enforcement officers, compared to being more than 46 percent of the working population, according to a 2001 study by the National Center for Women
and Policing. So, while women have made important advances in law enforcement, more work remains to mentor young women and promote them into positions of responsibility, Moon says.
She adds, “I’m proud to say that young women can look at our agency and say, ‘I see myself there.’”Nevada County Sheriff Shannan Moon says softball is good for her mental health, and she plays at least twice weekly in several leagues in town and beyond.
Says Moon, “It’s fun to see how people, even as you get older, still have the drive to play. You may not have the level of skills you thought you had before, but it’s super fun to get out.”
