In the struggle to fill more than 370 vacancies in an increasingly competitive job market, the Honolulu Police Department is banking on greater oversight of its hiring to find enough qualified recruits to wear the uniform.

Of approximately 2,700 employees, HPD is authorized for about 2,100 police officer positions. “A little over 1,800 are filled, so we have 374 vacant sworn- officer positions,” said Capt. Parker Bode, who’s assigned to the department’s Human Resources Division.

Bode said having greater HPD oversight of its own hiring process eliminates some of the city’s red tape. “We’re trying to look at every avenue to recruit. We’re trying to do our best to fill the vacancies,” he added.

Still, Bode said HPD’s main barrier to hiring new officers comes down to finding the right people to fit law enforcement careers.

“We’re looking for those who possess high character and exemplify professionalism,” he said, adding that background checks help weed out applicants with criminal rec­ords or poor driving records. “We get the applicants but applicants don’t always amount to recruits at the academy, and it’s usually due to issues in the background.”

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Hawaii ranked fourth — behind California, Washington and New Jersey — among the top-paying states in 2022 for police and sheriff’s patrol officers. Police here earn an average annual salary of $89,640. That compares to an average annual salary of $104,010 in top-ranked California, federal data shows.

HPD accepts between 50 to 100 recruits per Police Academy class. Currently, the application process takes about three to six months, a faster turnaround than in years past.

“Before maybe it was six to nine months,” Bode said, noting that HPD’s Human Resources Division took over some of the steps in the application process previously done by the city’s Department of Human Resources. “We now do and oversee that process, so that has helped us to kind of decrease the processing time.”

To fill the hundreds of vacancies, HPD is promoting its policing work at job fairs and schools, to the military and even at fitness gyms. In addition to canvasing in as many places as it can, HPD intends to draw potential officers to its ranks with two new recruitment programs.

Its Pathways Internship Program — launched this year, with an application period that began this month — is aimed at college students expected to graduate with a bachelor’s degree and who intend on a career in law enforcement, Bode said.

“So they’ll apply to this internship program, and those who are selected will then go through an internship in their last semester prior to graduation where we expose them to the job, ignite their interest in the job and prepare them for the rigors of the Police Academy and a policing career,” he said.

During the internship, applicants will concurrently go through the hiring process, which includes background checks. Bode said the program is anticipated to start in January.

“The goal is that upon college graduation, they’ll enter into the next available recruit class with the tools and skills to be successful,” he said. “So they’ll go through their last semester — their spring semester — and then once they graduate in May, if that’s the time, then they will enter into the next available recruit class. Recruit class will then be for six months.”

Starting pay for recruits admitted to the Police Academy is $76,844, he said. Graduates of the intern program will earn $79,556 a year.

“So we’re paying them to go to school, and they’re learning laws and tactics and all of that,” Bode said. Pay is determined under the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers’ latest four-year contract, which runs to June 30, 2025.

In January, HPD also will start its Police Services Officer Program. Also known as the Cadet Program, the effort is aimed at high schoolers who don’t plan to go to college and community college students who may not yet meet all of the requirements to join the Police Academy.

Beyond its two new programs, HPD is considering changes to officer work schedules to allow for such quality-of-life issues as more family time. Currently, officers work five days a week on nine-hour shifts, known as the 5/9 shift. Under a new schedule, Bode said officers would transition to a 3/12 shift, working three days a week, 12 hours a shift.

That schedule, according to Bode, could include one week out of the month when officers would work four days for 12 hours each day.

“We think that it will help enhance the quality of our officers’ personal lives, so they’ll be able to spend more time at home,” Bode said, noting HPD is exploring other schedule options as well. “There’s a possibility that it can be three days for 13 hours and 20 minutes to cover the 40 hours.”

HPD does not currently offer a hiring bonus. “However, we are exploring it and we’re aware that other departments within the state and on the mainland are offering hiring bonuses,” Bode said.

HPD’s benefits include free life insurance, tuition reimbursement, a retirement plan and public worker pensions.

Meanwhile, Honolulu City Council Chair Tommy Waters said while every vacancy is critical to how the city delivers services to the public, he’s focused on the “proper staffing” of its public safety departments, in particular the police.

“Our first responders operate around the clock, and the vacancies in HPD are worrisome,” Waters previously told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “As I’ve said before, a patrolling police officer is one of the best deterrents to crime.”

Waters added that he appreciates “the work of HPD in increasing the number of recruit classes held each year as well as their continued marketing efforts, and I look forward to working with HPD and the administration to find creative solutions to address these vacancies.”

The city’s 2024 fiscal year budget earmarks $352.9 million for the police department, and Waters said he’s proposed “that we fully fund HPD as they requested.”