Bill Text: HI SB58 | 2013 | Regular Session | Amended
Bill Title: Language Access Resource Center; Multilingual Website Pilot Project; Appropriations ($)
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 4-0)
Status: (Engrossed - Dead) 2013-03-07 - Referred to HLT, FIN, referral sheet 30 [SB58 Detail]
Download: Hawaii-2013-SB58-Amended.html
STAND. COM. REP. NO. 143
Honolulu, Hawaii
RE: S.B. No. 58
S.D. 1
Honorable Donna Mercado Kim
President of the Senate
Twenty-Seventh State Legislature
Regular Session of 2013
State of Hawaii
Madam:
Your Committee on Human Services, to which was referred S.B. No. 58 entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO LANGUAGE ACCESS,"
begs leave to report as follows:
The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish and provide appropriations for a statewide language access resource center and multilingual website pilot project to be administered by the Office of Language Access.
Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Human Resources Development, Office of Language Access, Hawaii Public Housing Authority, Hawaii Civil Rights Commission, Catholic Charities Hawaii, Congress of Visayan Organizations, Hawaii Hispanic News, Latin Chamber of Commerce, Hawaii State Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Hawaii Interpreter Action Network, Maui Learning LLC, and twenty-two individuals.
Your Committee finds that despite the inception of Hawaii's language access law and the Office of Language Access, there are still major challenges in Hawaii regarding agency compliance, such as the lack of a comprehensive and centralized system or structure in Hawaii to identify qualified language interpreters and translators and the lack of multilingual websites that can help limited English proficient persons access needed information from state agencies in their own language. Ironically, Hawaii has a dearth of competent language interpreters and translators available to assist limited English proficient individuals. Your Committee further finds that a language access resource center will benefit agencies, interpreters, translators, and the limited English proficient population alike since it addresses the problem of supply and demand of interpreters and translators, increases and improves the number and quality of language service providers, and provides Hawaii's limited English proficient population a better means to access state and state-funded services.
Your Committee has amended this measure by:
(1) Including updated statistics regarding limited English proficient persons;
(2) Broadening the credentials and qualifications of language interpreters and translators that must be listed on a publicly available roster;
(3) Inserting an appropriation amount of $400,000 to establish a statewide language access resource center and $190,000 to establish a multilingual website pilot project;
(4) Inserting an end date of June 30, 2016, for the multilingual website pilot project;
(5) Requiring the Office of Language Access to submit a report regarding the pilot project to the Legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the Regular Session of 2017; and
(6) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.
As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Human Services that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 58, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 58, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Human Services,
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____________________________ SUZANNE CHUN OAKLAND, Chair |
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