Hawai‘i County filled 100 open positions in past year, but workforce still down 17%

When Kimo Alameda became mayor in December 2024, one of his priorities was to tackle the high number of government vacancies, describing how it negatively impacts Hawaiʻi County services as “bad business.”

A year ago, there were 690 open county positions. Residents were seeing fewer hours at transfer stations and public pools, and slower response to maintenance of roads, parks, fields and tree trimming. Clerk shortages regularly resulted in no one answering the phones when the public called the county for help, the mayor said.

At that time, Alameda formed a task force to tackle the issue within Human Resources. The task force brainstormed ideas about how to recruit.

Alameda said Wednesday that things have improved, with about 100 of those openings filled. But vacancies still are high, with 589 out of a workforce of 3,395 (17.3%).

“I just want to have less vacancies and better retention, because if you don’t have good retention, then you just always have vacancies because people are not happy with the quality,” Alameda said. “We had to attack this from both ends.” 

In some departments, including the building department, service has improved, Alameda said. With the hiring of nine clerks for openings in Hilo and Kona, all clerk positions in the building department have been filled, cutting down the delay in reviewing and processing permits. Alameda also added a supervising building permit clerk position.

Alameda said the task force attacked the vacancy problem from multiple angles, including recruiting at high schools and colleges. The task force also participated in job fairs. And the county is taking care of its current employees, who in turn become the “best recruiters,” the mayor said.

Sommer Tokihiro, director of Human Resources, said the county is proactively evaluating its position class specifications, position descriptions, department needs and making changes to broaden the applicant pool.

She said the county has removed the requirements for degrees in specific disciplines, unless there is a regulatory or statutory requirement that requires a degree in a specific area, such as engineering.

“It has resulted in more qualified applicants being referred to hiring departments for interviews,” Tokihiro said Friday.

The county has received more than 10,300 applications in 2025, compared to 9,200 in 2024.

“We have also been working with departments to recruit for positions at multiple levels, so we can attract applicants that may meet the requirements at a lower level, and provide on-the-job training and experience, and a career ladder progression to the permanent class of work,” Tokihiro said.

Benson Medina, the countyʻs director of research and development, has been building on the work started by Human Resources and is now working with nonprofits and the community college to find people wanting and needing work, whether it’s in the public or private sector.

But there were some areas in the country that saw increases in vacancies, most drastically the Department of Water Supply that went from 44 to 81 openings over the past year.

Kawika Uyehara, deputy for the water supply department, said one reason is that there was an increase of specifically needed positions between the last fiscal year and this year.

“Across the board in our department, each of our divisions had a little bit of an increase in the number of positions budgeted,” Uyehara said, noting a larger percentage of open positions was for the operating division.

“That’s our boots on the ground folks that take care of the systems island-wide,” he explained. “We have four operation base yards in Hilo, Waimea, Kona and Ka‘ū.”

Overall, the vacancy numbers reflect the Department of Water Supply’s increasing capacity and filling positions that have been vacated because of a variety of reasons, including retirements and separations, said Tom Callis, a county spokesperson.

“The increase in personnel budget is due to current and anticipated workloads, promotional opportunities for current staff, continuity of operations, and succession planning,” Callis said.

Positions within the Department of Water Supply are approved by the Water Board. A call to the board secretary went unreturned.

Tokihiro said positions within all departments are based on operational needs.

“In some cases, departments are able to re-evaluate vacant positions and reallocate positions to a different position to address a current need, and not have to add a position,” she said. “In other cases, the department may still have the operational need for the vacant position and they just haven’t been able to fill through recruitment, and new needs arise for positions in other areas. We look closely at current vacancies to evaluate all options when considering the need for adding positions in our departments.”

Callis also said vacant positions in the county fluctuate with people leaving for other jobs or additional funding for positions that become available.

The task force has transitioned to fall under the county Department of Research and Development. Alameda said the county is in the next stage, where he recognizes a lack of employees across public and private sectors, including hospitality, construction and technology.

In the county, the Department of Environmental Management remains particularly challenging for filling openings, with many of the positions requiring a certain skillset, like those who work on wastewater, or requiring people who can work in the field and the office.

Alameda said he would like more middle management engineers in public works. He also would like more project managers in parks and recreation.

“There are a lot of projects that I want completed, but they can only move as fast as the staff,” Alameda said. “If you don’t have somebody overseeing the project, then it cannot move.”

A projects manager with parks and recreation or wastewater has an annual salary range of $72,516 to $103,212.

Alameda said the county also struggles with finding lifeguards for the public pools, saying they seem to lose candidates to the ocean safety side because the pay is a little better.

To address this, Alameda said, the county lowered the age for applicants to 16 years old after certification.

A pool lifeguard trainee has an annual salary range of $43,272 to $64,056. Pool lifeguard and senior pool lifeguard positions have an annual salary range from $46,800 to $74,904.

Also, Alameda thinks that honoring hazard pay earned during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 helped show county employees they were valued. The mayor estimated paying $50 million to almost 3,000 employees from four unions: State of Hawai‘i Organization of Police Officers, Hawai‘i Firefighters Association, Hawai‘i Government Employees Association and United Public Workers.

The mayor also does regular employee shoutouts during his Friday updates that post on social media to help with morale.

There now are three departments in the county with zero vacancies: Civil Defense Agency, the Office of Housing, and the Office of Sustainability, Climate, Equity and Resilience.

Here is the full list of vacancies by department as of Jan. 31. Click here to see all county jobs, salaries and how to apply.

Aging – Funded positions: 20; Vacancies: 7
Animal Control – Funded positions: 48; Vacancies: 17
Civil Defense – Funded positions: 12; Vacancies: Zero
Corporation Counsel – Funded positions: 35; Vacancies: 6
County Clerk/Council – Funded positions: 20; Vacancies: 7
Environmental Management – Funded positions: 235; Vacancies: 41
Finance – Funded positions: 166; Vacancies: 23
Housing – Funded positions: 65; Vacancies: Zero
Human Resources – Funded positions: 37; Vacancies: 8
Information Technology – Funded positions: 40; Vacancies: 14
Liquor Control – Funded positions: 20; Vacancies: 2
Mass Transit – Funded positions: 26; Vacancies: 6
Office of the Mayor – Funded positions: 23; Vacancies: 1
Parks and Recreation – Funded positions: 445; Vacancies: 60
Planning – Funded positions: 74; Vacancies: 15
Prosecuting Attorney – Funded positions: 132; Vacancies: 12
Public Works – Funded positions: 428; Vacancies: 68
Research and Development – Funded positions: 24; Vacancies: 6
Office of Sustainability, Climate, Equity and Resilience – Funded positions: 7; Vacancies: Zero
Water Supply – Funded positions: 234; Vacancies: 81
Hawai‘i Island police – Funded positions: 706; Vacancies: 148
Hawai‘i Fire Department – Funded positions: 558; Vacancies: 67