I just moved from Hawaii June 06. Pearl City or PC is a **** hole. Seriously, if you dont mind your property being stolen, vandalized etc move there, however, PC is not the only place to live. I lived in Kapolei/Makakilo, closest to Barbers Point NAS you can get, quiet, affordable and way way less crime. Move farther West towards Wainae and you run into major crime, drugs etc.... Moving more S. central is Ewa Beach, which connects to a small NAS, part is very nice, upscale but afforable and quiet, more southernly is old Ewa = dirty, higher crime etc... There are other places as well, like Mililani, which has a very nice and somewhat affordable area, less crime etc. especially on the Mauka (mountain) side. This is assuming the base your talking about working would be Pearl Harbor, or Barbers Point.
On the other side of Oahu is the MCB and there are some nice areas surrounding that as well.
Central isle and moving south towards PC it rains A LOT, and the rain is no joke at times, makes very nasty riding. Lots of crazy punk kids zippin around in their fart canned import beaters street racing, much more common since the track closed in april 06, after the lease ran out and it divided the racing community. I still have close ties to the island and will return to visit. At one time I wanted to retire there as I had many career opp's, but since moving and not getting reassigned back there, I'll pass. Overall too much crime, drugs and discrimination (I'm haole (white) and my wife is Haitian (looks ***** or black)) and we dealt with more issues there than anywhere else I've been stationed. Of course an equal amount of the discrimination was due to me being Army... more less Hawaiians (or a good part of those living there of Polynesian and Hawaiian descendants) would prefer to have the Military removed from the island. Hope this helps.