Only two consulting firms bid to help the Honolulu Police Commission sift through 24 applicants to find finalists for commissioners and the public to consider because they have to determine candidates’ psychological makeup after having no role in the recruitment process.

The consultant will “assist with the examination and assessment of psychological competency and other characteristics for the selection of the Chief of Police,” according to the commission’s formal request for proposals. In addition to creating an avenue for public comment and training five evaluators for the assessment center, the consultant will “analyze and identify the key skills, abilities and psychological characteristics needed and desired for the position of Honolulu Chief of Police.”

The lack of qualified consultants applying to serve the commission delayed the selection process by 30 days.

“It’s an interesting process. I passed initially based on the RFP requirements, but if the Police Commission is entertaining additional bids, they might consider a contemporary approach to evaluating the candidates,” Gary Peterson, president and CEO of Public Sector Search and Consulting, a California based firm that was hired to recruit and retain police chiefs in Seattle; San Francisco; Sacramento, Calif.; San Jose, Calif.; Dallas; Nashville, Tenn.; and Raleigh, N.C., told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “Typically, a consultant does the recruiting, the vetting and the interview. The consultant normally would, as I did in San Francisco, develop questions for the commission, based on what the community wants to see in the next police chief. Police leaders need to be on the cutting edge of best police practices, understand contemporary police approaches to addressing violent crime, community engagement and re-imagining policing.”

Few, if any, search firms would be qualified to assess a candidate’s psychological competence and would have to contract out that service to a third party, he said. Ruling out a candidate based on a psychological evaluation before a conditional job offer is made may not be legal and could lead to allegations of discrimination.

Peterson said depending on the public-records laws in each state, police commissions either make all of the applicants known to the public or they release a list of finalists.

“If you want to build trust in a community, you try to get that information out,” he said. “On the flip side, if you publish the list of candidates too early, some of the best candidates will drop out.”

That sentiment was echoed by Honolulu Police Commissioner Carrie K.S. Okinaga during the May 19 meeting when she and Chairwoman Shannon L. Alivado highlighted the historic closed nature of the police chief selection process, citing state procurement laws and policies governing budgeting and fiscal services as legal hurdles to disclosure that must be carefully navigated.

“There are hiring process that are way out in the open, like academia is very much out in the open,” said Okinaga on May 19. “Historically, it’s not been in the open with the hiring of the chief because it limits your pool, substantially, of people who are willing to throw their names in to apply.”

Community advocates are pushing for more public involvement in the search process and beyond through the formation of a citizen advisory committee.

Lesley Gabrielle and Cathy Lee are among dozens of advocates who have been critical of the commission and HPD for their lack of transparency and inclusion of local people who are traditionally over-policed, like Black, Micronesian and Hawaiian citizens. The pair, along with others, submitted answers to the commission’s questions about a citizen advisory committee over the weekend and are awaiting feedback. They released a study of the commission through the years and claimed members were overwhelmingly “East Asian” and Caucasian, well educated and high-earning professionals.

The search process and HPD needs community involvement to ensure underrepresented communities have a say.

“They are not representative of our broad and diverse community; this is a small circle of people whose most significant unifying factor is knowing a Mayor,” Lee and Gabrielle said in a statement sent to the Star-Advertiser. “They seemed to be contemplating other methods of public input, but their ideas really ended up just significantly watering down our ask for a meaningful method of involving the public. In fact, at one point, they seemed confused as to why the 3-minute public testimony platform wouldn’t be sufficient as ‘having provided an opportunity for public input.’ It’s even more surprising, given that the last time Honolulu had a chief hiring process, HPC Chair Max Sword hand- selected the community members to participate in the ‘assessment center’ in a selection process so secret that even the other Commissioners were not privy to it. A broad, diverse public was never given an opportunity to participate in the process, and was never given the opportunity to provide information to the police commission regarding community concerns prior to the selection of the finalists.”

Alivado said the commission remains open to hearing suggestions from citizen advisory committee proponents. She noted that in the past processes, some of the proposed concepts were used, including community questions for applicants and asking the public to work with the consultant to identify important characteristics for the next police chief.

Police Commission Executive Officer James K.S. Yuen and Alivado did not comment about the consultant or psychological evaluation component of the search.

Honolulu City Council Chairman Tommy Waters, Vice Chairwoman Esther Kiaaina, City Council Committee on Public Safety Chairwoman Heidi Tsune­yoshi and Vice Chairman Augie Tulba did not respond to request for comments about the search for the police chief or the decision by the commission to keep the names of the 24 candidates from the commissioners and the public. The Public Safety Committee meeting in June was canceled for an undisclosed reason, and members did not comment about whether they would discuss HPD’s leadership search during the committee’s meeting in July.

Honolulu Police Department … by Honolulu Star-Advertiser