Concerns about overtime expenses and staffing shortages at the Honolulu Police Department continue as the Honolulu City Council and Honolulu Police Commission review a potential $12 million cut to the police department’s budget.
The proposed city budget would provide HPD with just over $300 million for fiscal year 2022, a drop from $312 million appropriated the year before, and in budget presentations to the police commission on Wednesday and the City Council on Tuesday, HPD tried to assuage concerns of high overtime expenses and officer shortfalls.
Assistant Chief Rade Vanic told the Council that about $10 million in cuts would come from salary expenses that would have been allocated to vacant civilian and uniformed positions within the department, but Council Chairman Tommy Waters said those would be offset by overtime expenses.
HPD paid $38 million for overtime in fiscal year 2019, nearly doubling the $19 million it spent in 2015.
The police commission reported that HPD spent $31.6 million in overtime in 2020, as well as about $17 million in federal aid for HPD’s COVID-19 enforcement teams.
“My concern is that if we’re reducing here in the salaries but we end up having to pay more in overtime, it really isn’t a savings at all,” Waters said.
Vanic said HPD has been addressing overtime expenses by reassigning officers to patrol duty, where most officer overtime comes from.
“A lot of the overtime in recent years came from patrol staffing, but we don’t want to reduce patrol staffing. So, how do you get the same amount of work with less money? You take people from where they’re not needed as much,” he said.
When Councilwoman Andria Tupola asked what leads to overtime, Vanic said two common reasons are officers’ requirements to go to court to provide evidence and file police reports after responding to an incident late in their shifts.
Councilman Brandon Elefante asked how HPD is working to lower those costs. Vanic said tracking tools are in place and that there needs to be more accountability for officers and their managers, who were blamed for last year’s overtime abuse of federal relief aid for the coronavirus pandemic.
The overtime is essential, according to the police commission, because of HPD’s manpower shortage.
As of Feb. 8 there were 324 vacancies for uniformed officer positions, HPD reported.
The department said it’s addressing the shortage by getting more police recruits in the door to offset the officers who retire every year — about 80 or 90, Deputy Chief Aaron Takasaki-Young said during Wednesday’s police commission meeting.
A possible issue that keeps HPD from filling its vacancies is money, according to a report by the police commission.
The report, which makes recommendations to Mayor Rick Blangiardi on HPD’s budget, said HPD should conduct a “study to determine whether increasing the basic pay of officers would improve recruiting and lower the loss of officers, and as a result lower overtime costs while continuing to pay officers a fair wage without overtime.”
It also said HPD should consider paying the moving costs for officers who decided to move to
Honolulu.
