HPD officers
wanted -- by
mainland departments

Four more departments will come
to recruit from 'Honolulu's Finest'

By Jaymes K. Song
Star-Bulletin

Honolulu police officers are on the Pacific Northwest's "Most Wanted" list.

Four more police departments -- from Washington state and Oregon -- are trying to recruit hundreds of "Honolulu's Finest."

Recruiters from the Portland Police Department, Washington State Patrol, Multnomah County Sherriff's Office and the Oregon State Police Department are scheduled to host a joint recruiting session starting Sept. 21 at the Prince Kuhio Hotel.

"The unemployment rate is under 4 percent now, and you got the police departments all hiring," said Ron Baldwin, recruiter for the Washington State Patrol.

"The employment pool is pretty tight. It's a tough market and we're looking for quality people."

The four departments are in addition to the King County Sherriff's Office, which near the end of the month is separately sending a team of six people, including two former Honolulu police officers, to recruit for the Seattle-based department.

The Portland team, which has two former Honolulu police officers, will try to get enough applicants to fill 80 openings now and 220 additional openings it anticipates in the next few years.

Multnomah has 70 openings, and is quickly expanding.

"One of the biggest exports in Hawaii is highly trained police officers," said Lt. Bennie Atkinson, president of the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers. "We are exporting millions of dollars of highly trained police officers."

Portland originally planned to recruit just at a job fair at the Pearl Harbor Naval Base. But because of dozens of inquiries from Honolulu officers, Portland officials extended their efforts.

The Oregon State Police Department, headquartered in Salem, Ore., wants to recruit for about 80 openings it has each year.

"We hired a couple people from Hawaii and we're receiving quite a bit of interest," said Oregon recruiter Robert Dicey. "So we jumped on the bandwagon. We've seen several applications come in. We combined our interest with other agencies, and we're working together."

Hundreds of officers leaving for the bustling Pacific Northwest would be devastating to the Honolulu Police Department, which has struggled to fill hundreds of vacancies caused by an exodus of officers choosing an early retirement plan.

SHOPO said there are another 260 HPD officers who plan to retire in the next couple of years.

"We were in the same situation at the beginning of 1995," said Police Chief Lee Donohue. "We would employ the same strategy we used then if (an exodus) were to happen again" -- using salaries saved from officer vacancies to allocate more overtime pay.

HPD already has employed "accelerated hiring," realigned patrol areas, exhausted millions in overtime pay and spent thousands on a recruiting campaign because of the vacancies.

As of Aug. 1, the department had 205 vacancies out of the 2,128 officers it is allowed.

Only King County is offering a lateral move, which means officers who are recruited will be able to retain their rank and years of service. The others will have to start over and go through academy training again. Also, Portland requires its officers to have a four-year college degree.

However, in the mainland departments, an officer with only five years of experience earns about the same as or more than an HPD lieutenant with 15 years of experience.

"I'm going to sign up," Donohue said jokingly. He added, "Sure, I'm concerned, but how can you stop it. It's a free country.

"If I were a chief in the Northwest looking for officers, I'd probably do the same thing. Hawaii officers have proven themselves."

In addition to the attractive pay scale, the mainland departments are luring officers with a lower cost of living, strong public school systems, no state income tax in Washington, no sales tax in Oregon, affordable homes and excellent benefits.

"Our package will beat anybody," Washington state's Bald-win said.

Washington state offers 2 percent salary bonuses for officers with a two-year college degree, or 4 percent for those with a four-year degree. They also have 5 percent differential pay for officers working the night or early morning shifts and will pay for tuition and books at any state college.

Atkinson said pay has to be raised for Honolulu officers so "the decision to go is very hard to make. . . . We obviously must have really well-trained officers if they're all coming down now. This is a flood, and more are coming."

Mayor Jeremy Harris could not be reached for comment.