OREGON SENATE DECLINES TO VOTE ON CONTROVERSIAL HEALTHCARE INTERPRETING BILL SB 584
In a rapid about-face, Oregon’s State Senate has decided not to vote on Oregon Senate Bill 584 (OR SB584), a healthcareinterpretingbillthathadthepotentialtodisrupt language services for patients with limited English proficiency(LEP).
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The state’s Senate Health Care Committee’s latest work session was on April 3, 2023, but an actual vote on the bill remainedunscheduled.
Senator Kayse Jama (D) introduced the bill, “Relating to healthcare interpreters,” in January 2023. SB584 would have requiredtheOregonHealthAuthority(OHA)tocreateawebbased platform healthcare providers could use to contact, schedule,andpayinterpreters.
The Senate’s decision follows the American Translator Association’s critical February 2023 letter about the bill and, morerecently,advocacyeffortsbyanOregonTaskForceled byKristinQuinlanofCertifiedLanguagesandDavidBrackett atLinguava,withguidancefromahiredlobbyist.
Coalition members from several other language service providers (LSPs), including LanguageLine, Boostlingo, and AMN, also participated. The group also hired an Oregon lobbyistforguidance.
According to an April 18, 2023 newsletter sent out by the Association of Language Companies (ALC), “The Oregon Task Force mobilized hundreds of comments in opposition tothebill,multipletestimoniesattheOregonSenateHealth Committee hearings, and in-person advocacy in Salem againstthebill.”
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Cynthia Roat, a Washington-based consultant on language accessinhealthcare,wasoneprofessionaltosharetestimony relatedtothebill.
Some of her remarks addressed a possible requirement by SB584 that LSPs outside Oregon register all their interpreters withtheOregonHealthAuthority,regardlessofwhetherornot the OHA would pay for their service — a demand Roat describedas“notreasonable.”
A 2021 bill, HB 2359, currently requires healthcare providers to seek OHA-registered interpreters before seeking assistance fromanLSP.
Since, as the ATA pointed out in its letter, the state’s registry includes interpreters for fewer than 40 languages far fewer than the 150 requested by patients in 2021 LSPs often fill in thegaps.
“These lists of contractors are confidential to each business, and LSPs are unlikely to be willing to share them, nor will individual interpreters residing in other states, providing services nationally, be interested in applying to be listed on Oregon’s registry,” Roat explained, adding that many remote LSPsmightsimplyoptnottoworkinOregon,whichrepresents arelativelysmallshareofthemarket.
“Common sense prevailed, at least for another year,” ALC AdvocacyConsultantBillRiverswroteinanupdateonthebill. “We expect that [proponents] will try again, but we will be ready.”
Tip of the hat to Katharine Allen for an update on this development.
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