MPD getting set to launch new helicopter and train officers for canine units

The Maui Police Department’s new helicopter, dubbed “Blue Thunder,” will be operational by this summer, supported by officers on the ground with new portable radios with enhanced capabilities, members of the Maui County Council’s Budget, Finance and Economic Development Committee learned Wednesday.

Referring to the helicopter, Police Chief John Pelletier said: “It’s on Maui… It’s being completed. The paint scheme is a play on the current police vehicles. The department voted on it. Hekili is thunder in Hawaiian. That’s its name, Blue Thunder.”

The “go live” date will be this summer, he said. “And it’s extremely exciting with what we’re going to be able to do with that.”

The helicopter will add night-flying capability for Maui County police and firefighters, and make it possible for rapid transport of police personnel throughout the tri-isle county, including remote Maui areas, such as Hāna.

On Wednesday, committee members did not go into detail about the department’s helicopter program. Last year, the Council approved the police chief’s request to reallocate $500,000 in the department’s budget for an air unit with night vision capabilities. Earlier, questions had been raised about the cost of the program.

Pelletier said at the time that the Police Department was not going to buy a helicopter, but would deploy the aircraft through an exclusive use contract, just as the Maui Fire Department does with its helicopter.

He said at the time that the contract would include the cost of pilots, hangar fees, lease rent, recertification, maintenance and a $10 million insurance policy. The $1,500 hourly cost for helicopter deployment is on top of the contractor cost, the chief told council members last year.

According to a MPD PowerPoint presentation, search-and-rescue personnel will be selected this month. Training for officers deployed in the helicopter will be held in May, and the aircraft will be operational in July.

The department’s fiscal 2026 budget request includes $3.6 million for professional services to train police and for flight time helicopter operations.

Overall, the Police Department is requesting a 23.2% increase — from $84,484,500 approved for this fiscal year to $104,069,958 in fiscal 2026. The department has 570.7 personnel. Its budget seeks another 13.6 positions, for a total of 584.3, or a 2.4% increase.

Council Member Shane Sinenci asked Pelletier if the department had been informed of any Homeland Security activities on Maui, meaning round-ups of undocumented immigrants.

Pelletier said his department has a “very good working relationship” with federal agencies as well as with the island’s immigrant community, which is why the department created an MPD Multicultural Advisory Council.

“We do not participate with our federal partners in immigration enforcement,” he said, although he said Homeland Security officers were on Maui last Thursday. “We care about individuals that are committing violent crimes. We do not care about immigration status. We don’t ask that, period. If you’re a bad guy, doing bad things, then you should be worried.”

In other discussion with council members, Pelletier introduced the department’s canine program, with its first two dogs named Ku Makani and Maka Ihe. “These are the first patrol police dogs in the state,” he said.

The first two MPD officers assigned to handle the dogs will leave this weekend for a six-week training program, followed by more training on Maui, Pelletier said.

“We’ve also purchased the other two dogs,” he said. “There’ll be eight in total to begin with. One will be on Molokaʻi, for sure, and then we can look to expand, as needed, to Lānaʻi.”

“This is a game changer,” he said. “This will change policing. This will actually be an incredible de-escalation tactic and technique, and I think it’s going to be an incredible recruiting and retention thing that we will all be very proud of.”

The department’s budget proposal says the K-9 program’s continuing cost would be $200,000.

A radio shop site battery replacement is budgeted for $1,014,403, but Pelletier said that cost item is “deceptive” showing up as a Police Department budget item when other County departments use MPD’s radio system. “Fire uses it. Parks use it,” he said. “Everybody in the County uses the radio system that we’ve built.”

Long-term investment in a County radio system pays off, he said, adding that the only reason Maui County had radio communications during the August 2023 wildfire disaster was that there were radio towers in place on Lānaʻi and the Hawaiʻi island that prevented the blackout of the radios.

Among other highlights, the department plans to convert two part-time cold case detectives to full-time jobs.

Currently on special assignment, the officers are conducting missing person investigations, cold cases, homicides and sexual assaults, Pelletier said. “They’re doing remarkable work, and instead of just keeping them (part-time), we need to make them permanent.”

The department also is requested a new position for an information practices coordinator for Uniform Information Practices Act requests, he said. After the wildfires, “it’s a full-time job.”

Funding also is budgeted for a counselor in the department’s Critical Outreach and Response through Education, or CORE program. That program facilitates and leads the Live In Your Truth program, which aims to help young people 14 to 24 who may be unsheltered, coping with mental illness or substance abuse or who are at risk.

“They just do an exceptional job,” Pelletier said. “And, again, that’s being specially assigned, and so we do need to make that permanent.”

The department is also seeking $2 million for the final component of the Computer-Assisted Dispatch Record Management System. “This will be the best computer dispatch system in the state when it’s done,” he said. “These are for the final interfaces, the final pieces to do. We anticipate going live by the end of the third quarter this year.”

There’s also some extra money included to help build a real-time operations center, he said.

Pelletier said the department wants to buy radios that cost $7,500 each, “but what’s great about this radio (is that it) will pick up cell and WiFi from the building that you’re in.”

Replacing radios in half of fleet vehicles is projected to cost $2,070,000.

Also current radios are getting technologically obsolete, he said.

“The current radios that are being made are like an iPhone 8, if you will,” he said. “Eventually, it’s not going to be supported. They’re not manufacturing those radios anymore, and so it’s an evolving technology . . . I don’t think that it’s something that we want to shy away from.”

The department also is requesting $374,900 for subsidized vehicles — $350,000 for an auto allowance, and $24,900 for insurance.

Pelletier told council members that the Police Department’s Forensic Facility has a rapid DNA machine that was used in identifying people who died in the Maui wildfires.

“Nobody else has that right now,” he said, adding that a DNA profile can be done in less than an hour, compared to within 24 hours.

And, the department is seeking $304,000 for cybercrime unit laptops, and $310,000 for drones and unmanned small aircraft systems.

The administration of Mayor Richard Bissen has proposed a budget of $1.512 billion for next fiscal year. The county expects to receive $357.6 million in grant funds, and has allocated $121.2 million in revolving funds for disaster recovery.

Council members have until early June to complete their work on the County’s annual spending plan and pass it on second-and-final reading. The County’s fiscal 2026 budget goes into effect July 1.