More non-English speakers

Nick speaks Chuukese, one of numerous languages spoken by Micronesians, among the newest and fastest-growing groups of non-English speakers arriving in the Islands.

His group represents an aspect of change in the multinational face of Hawai'i residents. Although there are no comprehensive figures on requests for interpreters statewide, some individual state and private agencies have taken snapshots.

For example, the state Health Department had until two years ago a contract with a private agency called Bilingual Access Line that provided monthly reports of requests, said Gerald Ohta, the department's affirmative action officer.

In 1999 a total of 661 requests for service came in, 317 from Korean speakers. However, he said those figures may be skewed because that year there was a heavy influx of clients from the Korean community in the Health Department's dental services program.

Other heavy users of services, according to 1999 figures from the state Health and Human Services departments, include speakers of Vietnamese, Ilocano and Cantonese.

Since then, the population of Micronesians and other groups has grown. Danny Rescue, senior counsel at the consulate for the Federated States of Micronesia, said the consulate's last census of Micronesians in Hawai'i recorded a population of 4,000, a number that, he said, has nearly doubled now.

Almost half of those people come from Chuuk, the most populous of the federation's four states. But frequent calls for interpretive service also come in from Pohnpeians and Kosraeans, as well as from the Marshallese, Micronesians who hail from the independent Republic of the Marshall Islands.

Trouble with bill

Numbers increased through the 1990s due to the enactment of "compacts of free association" that allow easy migration to the United States for the Marshallese and citizens of the federated states, Rescue said. The culture shock can be intense, he added, especially for those who come primarily seeking medical treatments. These are often families that are less educated and employable than those who come for school.

And the problem is complicated, he said, by the fact that there are nine languages represented by the tiny Micronesian nations, in a place already coping with a full array of largely Asian and Pacific immigrant groups. Most of the newcomers have to lean heavily on family and church connections to survive when they can't find institutional support.

It's an adjustment made a little easier by the young. Keichi Kin, 19, migrated from Chuuk five years ago and, she said, survived with the help of networks at home and at her school, Farrington.

"I had friends that went to that school," said Kin, who now works as a security guard. "They escorted me to my classes and translated for me."

The needs seem so massive that it's difficult to say what steps should be taken first. Pat McManaman is executive director of Na Loio, a nonprofit agency providing legal services to the immigrant population here and an active supporter of the failed Language Access Commission bill.

The bill foundered primarily over a technical error, she said: The version that emerged assigned the commission to the state Office of the Attorney General because a revision that would have placed it under the state Department of Labor was never made. That department's Office of Community Services had agreed to house the commission even without money attached to it, McManaman said, largely because Na Loio and other agencies had offered to shoulder some of the initial setup work.

But the final version passed by lawmakers failed to reflect that, and the governor vetoed it in June. The commission's work doesn't fall within the AG's office mission, state Attorney General Earl Anzai said.

"There was no appropriation, and it needed a part-time administrative and support staff, and the commission's expenses for travel and other things," Anzai said. "Plus, where would we house them?"

Arakaki, who sponsored the bill, said another attempt would be made to establish the commission next year.

Tracking the problem

Meanwhile, some scattered efforts are being made to improve the situation. Increasingly, there is an attempt to consider language skills in hiring at some state agencies that provide direct services to immigrants.

At the judiciary, in particular, emphasis has been placed on language access. The state Supreme Court has a Committee on Equality and Access in the Courts, which has launched several initiatives, said courts spokeswoman Marsha Kitagawa. Among these: translating informational brochures into various languages; videos explaining court procedures, dubbed into Korean and Ilocano; pending improvements to the judiciary Web site making it more accessible; and keeping a directory of bilingual attorneys.

McManaman, still unhappy over the aborted birth of the Language Access Commission, has kept files on the problem. She is especially livid when she sees official letters written in English by local government agencies, sent to non-English speakers, letters that are sometimes confrontational and that are accompanied by no efforts to communicate in the recipient's own language.

She tried in vain to convince one recipient, a Vietnamese woman, to sue over such a letter.

"These people don't want to do that," she said. "They're usually shy, happy to be here and often come from places where people are afraid to fight with the government."

But McManaman is determined that if the situation doesn't improve radically — and soon — she will find someone to go to court.

"This is a state that operates by consent decree," she said. "Well, if that's how they want it, that's what I'll do."

The pressure placed on government to comply with equal-access laws has been minimal, said Alohalani Boido, a Spanish-speaking court interpreter currently pressing the judiciary for better pay. One reason interpreters are in short supply, she said, is that the pay is too low to keep them in the profession any longer than it takes to get a "real job."

And few pay attention to the constituency they serve, Boido said.

"Who needs interpreters? They're people who are poor and brown," she said. "They're at the bottom of the social heap."