Kusaka disregarded
state law in hiring police

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By Anthony Sommer
tsommer@starbulletin.com

LIHUE >> Despite a record number of vacancies on the Kauai Police Department, former Kauai Mayor Maryanne Kusaka disregarded a new state law that allows mainland police officers to apply for jobs in Hawaii.

Kusaka's decision to avoid implementing the law, which went into effect July 1, came to light this week when Mayor Bryan Baptiste's office confirmed that the new mayor recently gave Police Chief George Freitas the green light to begin recruiting police officers on the mainland.

"Initially we were puzzled why the police chief felt he needed the new mayor's blessing to recruit on the mainland when that law went into effect last July 1," said Gary Hue, Baptiste's administrative assistant.

"We learned the former administration still wanted to keep the recruiting within the state, even though the law allowed recruitment nationwide."

Kusaka could not be reached for comment. Her former chief aide, Wally Rezentes Sr., said he was not aware of the situation.

"I don't think the personnel department broke any laws," he said.

There are no known mainland applicants for the Kauai Police Department who were turned down because they were not residents after July 1. Had any been rejected because they were not from Hawaii, it would have been a violation of the law.

Instead, the county simply did not let mainland police officers know jobs were available.

The County Personnel Department, which has the primary responsibility for advertising vacancies in all county departments, never placed any ads in mainland police professional journals or union newspapers announcing Kauai was seeking officers, according to Freitas.

And the Kauai County attorney, who is appointed by the mayor and charged with informing county agencies of changes in state law, never told the Kauai Police Commission of the rescinding of the residency requirement.

"As far as I know, there is still a one-year residency requirement," Stanton Pa, chairman of the Kauai Police Commission said last week.

Told the requirement had been repealed, Pa said, "That's news to me."

The previous law, which is still on the books, requires all applicants for all state or county jobs in Hawaii to have maintained residency in Hawaii for at least one year before applying.

However, that requirement could be waived by any mayor if a county was unable to attract qualified applicants from within the state.

Freitas, who has been police chief since 1995, said Kusaka turned down every request he made to waive the residency requirement for mainland applicants.

In Honolulu the requirement was routinely waived because of the shortage of police officers, and Honolulu has recruited on the mainland for the past two years, Freitas said.

Freitas said that despite the fact that in the last half of 2002, Kauai has had its highest vacancy rate since he became chief -- 21 vacancies in the 140 positions allocated -- the former mayor refused to recruit on the mainland after the law was passed.

"They didn't even want to look throughout the state," Freitas said. "They wanted to have Kauai residents only."

Freitas said Kusaka screened all of the police applications and interviewed candidates herself.

"She scrutinized every officer we hired," Freitas said.