HPD Chief Susan Ballard plans to ‘shore up’ neighborhood beats with infusion of new officers

The Honolulu Police Department plans to “shore up” parts of the department after Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s proposal for a large bump in positions for officers.

In the budget proposal Caldwell revealed Tuesday, he included 95 new positions for the department and the reactivation of six others to combat crime. All but 16 will be for sworn officers.

Chief of Police Susan Ballard said during a Honolulu Police Commission meeting Wednesday that it would be the largest influx of personnel to the department in decades.

“I know in at least the last probably 35 years … we’ve never seen that number coming to the police department,” she said. “Usually it’s one position here or one position there.”

Ballard said many of the positions will be used “just to shore up some of our areas.” That would include adding foot beats to Waikiki and Chinatown, but Ballard also mentioned Kailua “because it’s starting to grow to be a very important area for tourism.”

About a dozen positions would be used for the police department’s Homeless Outreach and Navigation for Unsheltered Persons initiative, “an area-based program that connects unsheltered persons to the kind of housing, shelter, or treatment program that best fits the needs of the individual,” as described by the city.

Ballard also mentioned that a few positions would go to the department’s cybercrime and elder abuse units.

Some of the civilian positions would go to the department’s video management unit to relieve officers currently doing that work.

But Ballard said it could be a few years to fill all the current vacancies in the police department — about 230 — and the new positions in Caldwell’s budget. Factors that contribute to the vacancies are retirement, leaving the island, low salaries and few qualified applicants, she said.

“(With) the current vacancies we have, plus the new 85 positions, you’re not going to realize a full-staffed police department probably until 2024, 2025,” she said.

None of the new positions in the budget proposal are currently funded. Ballard said if any of those positions need funding, money could be taken from current vacancies in the department.

About $312 million total would be allocated to HPD in Caldwell’s $2.98 billion budget proposal.

Star-Advertiser reporter Gordon Pang contributed to this story.