Bill to provide alerts in other languages passes Senate

OLYMPIA — A bill that would require public notices to be provided in languages other than English passed the senate unanimously on Monday.

SB 5046, sponsored by Sen. Bob. Hasegawa, D-Beacon Hill, will require state agencies to provide all public notices for emergencies in English and other languages that are spoken by a high percentage of the population.

The bill also requires districts to maintain and or have access to updated language and demographic data for their coverage areas.

Sen. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville, spoke in support of the bill. He said after living in eastern Washington and seeing several wildfires and small earthquakes, he realized that not everyone in his area spoke English and providing this information in other languages was an important aspect of public safety.

Sen. Judy Warnick, R-Moses Lake, also supported the bill. She said she became aware of the issue during the last few wildfire seasons, adding that many of the farm workers in the Grant County area don’t speak English and were not receiving or understanding the emergency service information that was coming in over radio or in other ways.

“It makes sense to me,” Warnick said. “Many of our farmworkers only speak Spanish, so it’s easy to support.”

During the hearing stage of the bill, representatives from the City of Everett and the Emergency Services Management Director of Renton testified against the bill. According to the legislative summary, the group was concerned that translating emergency service information in multiple languages would slow down the dissemination of information.

Warnick said she was unsure how languages other than Spanish would play out, but she felt providing emergency information in multiple languages would help overall.