Isle police pay too
low, panel told

By Mary Adamski
Star-Bulletin

The wages and benefits paid a Hawaii police officer with five years experience are 71 percent below the average of five-year veterans' pay in western cities of comparable size, a panel of arbitrators was told.

"This is a disaster either happening or waiting to happen," said Will Aitchison, a Portland attorney, testifying yesterday at the beginning of an arbitration hearing on the labor contract between the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers and the state and county governments.

The union representing 2,700 officers statewide was to resume its presentation today to the three-person panel responsible for reaching a new collective-bargaining agreement. Binding arbitration is mandated because the sides reached an impasse in negotiations on a contract to replace the two-year pact which expires June 30. The panel includes Karen Peterson of the city Department of Human Resources, Michael Kahoohanohano, SHOPO's chief negotiator, and California attorney Robert Steinberg acting as chairman.

Aitchison, who writes and lectures on collective bargaining, was retained by SHOPO to conduct a wage and benefit survey. He compared the Hawaii contract, which covers police in all four counties, with those of a dozen cities of similar size in Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada and Arizona.

"You have a serious problem in this agency," he told the arbitrators. "I don't care if you have an idyllic location . . . unless you do an immediate and substantial correction, they will start to vote with their feet."

The exodus of trained officers already has begun. At least 30 Honolulu officers have resigned to take jobs in the Pacific Northwest and mainland law enforcement agencies have undertaken aggressive recruitment to lure officers.

"You have sergeants leaving to become police officers - I've never seen that before," Aitchison said. "A police officer makes $800 more than a SHOPO sergeant, and $500 more than a SHOPO lieutenant."

SHOPO attorney David Gierlach said the average wage-and-benefit package in the comparable cities is $5,043 per month. A SHOPO member gets $2,940 per month, he said, "and that's without going into the cost of living difference."