| There will be a public hearing for HS HCS HB 1195
before the Senate Financial and Governmental Organization, Veterans'
Affairs and Elections Committee on Tuesday, April 27, 2004 at 8:30
a.m. in Senate Committee Room # 2. HS HCS HB 1195 is the bill that
contains language added in the House Professional Registration and
Licensing Committee by Representative Roy Holand from Springfield
that would require MCDHH to grant a "provisional public school
certificate" to any person nominated by a local school district to
interpret in their schools if that school district indicates that it
has searched for an interpreter who meets the current certification
and licensing requirements for educational interpreters but cannot
find one.
The current language of HS HCS HB 1195 would allow any school
district to hire anyone off the street to provide interpreting
services for deaf students, regardless of how incompetent they might
be. It would allow such a person to provide interpreting services
year after year without doing anything to improve their minimal
skills. It would completely exempt such persons from all the
licensing requirements for interpreters, thus freeing them from
following the Code of Ethics for Interpreters and allowing them to
work outside of schools in any setting that they chose, such as
emergency rooms, mental hospitals, and police stations. All of these
features are totally unacceptable to deaf and hard of hearing
consumers of interpreting services, and would do severe harm to deaf
students in public schools.
MCDHH will testify at the hearing on Tuesday and request that the
language that would create the "provisional public school
certificate" be deleted from the bill. This is a serious assault on
the integrity of the Missouri Interpreters Certification and
Licensure System, and one that could cause great harm to deaf
students in Missouri public schools. All advocates who would also
like to see that language deleted should:
(1) Come to Jefferson City and testify against that portion of
the bill next Tuesday morning, and/or
(2) Contact the members of that committee and let them know that
you are opposed to the language in HS HCS HB 1195 that would create
a "provisional public school certificate."
The e-mail addresses of the committee members are as follows:
Last Name First Name
Email Phone
Number
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