The nation’s police forces have come under intense public scrutiny in the past year or more, largely due to racial tensions that have pitted sectors of the city against law enforcement.

That divide doesn’t seem to afflict the Honolulu Police Department, whose corps of officers largely reflects the community it is assigned to protect.

However, as the series by Honolulu Star-Advertiser writer Rob Perez makes clear, there is a startling level of dubious conduct among some officers and little assurance that appropriate discipline is carried out.

At its core, the problem at HPD is one of secrecy. The department has never conducted itself with sufficient disclosure about its internal affairs, and without a healthy degree of transparency about its self-governance, the public can’t have the confidence that it needs in its police.

The Star-Advertiser’s three-part investigation tallied criminal cases, civil lawsuits and temporary restraining orders as indicators of where police may be, as the series title describes, “Crossing the Line.” Analysis of judicial records showed 335 officers accused of wrongdoing, or 16 percent of the department.

One out of six officers: That’s a ratio signaling a real problem that must be addressed, through greater openness in handling these cases, and more robust efforts at oversight by the Honolulu Police Commission.

The count includes various offenses, but complaints of domestic violence have produced some of the most outrage from citizens.

Two years ago a surveillance video of former police Sgt. Darren Cachola, no longer on the force, made news. The incident, recorded in a Waipahu restaurant where Cachola and his girlfriend appeared to be fighting, became part of a domestic abuse investigation. But initially, and most notably, Cachola was not arrested by responding officers.

Such indications that police officers are treated with kid gloves should be the source of public protest.

More recently, Police Chief Louis Kealoha promoted a major with a domestic-violence history to assistant chief; the uproar forced that decision to be reversed.

Both cases became public spectacles, and subject to debate and review. It’s the cases that never come to light that should demand a change.

The department countered that the tally of lawsuits does not mirror actual malfeasance, as police are prey to such accusations.

Civil suits comprised 241 cases in all, the largest portion of the total by far, and certainly there are many among them in which the allegations against police were not borne out.

But even this helps to make the larger point: The public should know something about disciplinary actions as they happen, to a far greater extent than it does now. The lack of disclosure can lead the community to assume the worst, and that doesn’t help to convey any sense that HPD has the matter in hand.

In their own defense, officials have asserted that there are penalties, and charges of domestic abuse are taken seriously. If so, they ought to be willing to accept reforms aimed at fairer treatment of those who bring complaints about police misconduct.

In particular, the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers, the union representative of the force, needs to stand down instead of obstructing these needed reforms when they come before the state Legislature and other bodies.

Here are course-correcting steps that should be taken:

>> A proposed amendment to the Honolulu City Charter, giving the police commission greater leeway in disciplining the police chief, should have the support of Honolulu voters.

And going beyond the scope of that change, the commission should be much more aggressively monitoring the conduct of the police force.

>> Lawmakers should revive a proposal to make the process of police disciplinary review far more transparent, which should improve accountability of the police to the residents they serve.

>> HPD also should support another measure aimed at making it easier for abuse complaints to be filed against officers.

Complainants should not face an obstacle course of requirements to start the inquiry process, particularly when it comes to domestic violence.

Certainly Honolulu’s police department deserves credit for performing its duties overwhelmingly without the estrangement witnessed in the violent uprisings in other cities. But it can and must do much better at policing itself, starting with a change in its culture of concealment.

In an era of social media, a much more sharply aware public has the right to expect the highest standards from police.