HB 2622 Hawaii House · 2026 Regular Session

RELATING TO LANGUAGE ACCESS.

Summary

Appropriates funds for the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency to increase access to bilingual resources and services for residents with limited English proficiency. Effective 7/1/3000. (HD1)

Tags: Emergency Management

Bill status passed 3 of 5 stages cleared

Introduction

Jan 2026

Committee Review

Mar 2026

House Passage

Mar 2026

Senate Passage

Governor

Introduced Jan 28, 2026 Last action Mar 10, 2026

Maddy AI version diff · 1 comparison

What changed between versions

HB2622 → HB2622_HD1 · 5 edits

MODERATE

The bill was amended to correct formatting and capitalization in the title and introductory text. The most significant substantive change is the effective date, which was altered from July 1, 2026, to July 1, 3000, likely as a placeholder or clerical error. The appropriation section was also updated to explicitly include the new effective date.

Scope change

The scope of the bill's applicability remains focused on the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency and language access, but the timeline for implementation has been drastically extended to the year 3000.

TIMELINE

The effective date of the Act was changed from July 1, 2026, to July 1, 3000.

TECHNICAL

The title was updated from 'HB2622' to 'HB2622 HD1' to reflect the House of Representatives committee action.

The title of the bill was capitalized to read 'RELATING TO LANGUAGE ACCESS' instead of 'relating to language access'.

Minor text edits were made to the body of the bill, including changing 'Office of Language Access' to 'office of language access' and adding a period after 'foreign-born'.

FISCAL

The appropriation section was updated to include the new effective date of July 1, 3000.

Floor votes

How they voted

This bill passed the House. No roll call record of that vote is available.

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Mar 10, 2026

Committee

Referred to PSM, WAM.

upper

Mar 6, 2026

Introduced

Received from House (Hse. Com. No. 129).

upper

Mar 5, 2026

Lower · Passed

Passed Third Reading with none voting aye with reservations; none voting no (0) and Representative(s) Perruso excused (1). Transmitted to Senate.

lower

Feb 27, 2026

Lower · Passed

The committee on FIN recommend that the measure be PASSED, UNAMENDED. The votes were as follows: 15 Ayes: Representative(s) Todd, Takenouchi, Hartsfield, Hussey, Keohokapu-Lee Loy, Kitagawa, Kusch, Miyake, Morikawa, Perruso, Templo, Yamashita, Alcos, Gedeon, Reyes Oda; Ayes with reservations: none; Noes: none; and 1 Excused: Representative(s) Lee, M..

lower

Feb 11, 2026

Committee

Reported from PBS (Stand. Com. Rep. No. 192-26) as amended in HD 1, recommending passage on Second Reading and referral to FIN.

lower

Feb 6, 2026

Lower · Passed

The committee on PBS recommend that the measure be PASSED, WITH AMENDMENTS. The votes were as follows: 9 Ayes: Representative(s) Belatti, Iwamoto, Hashem, Ichiyama, Morikawa, Poepoe, Woodson, Shimizu, Souza; Ayes with reservations: none; 0 Noes: none; and 0 Excused: none.

lower

Feb 2, 2026

Committee

Referred to PBS, FIN, referral sheet 6

lower

Jan 28, 2026

Introduced

Introduced and Pass First Reading.

lower

16 primary · 0 co-sponsors