Emergency teams focus on language gulf

In the winter of 2006-07, Western Washington was held hostage as hundreds of thousands were plunged into darkness by the strongest windstorm since 1993. It took more than five days to restore power to 1.5 million residents throughout the region.

Seventeen people died, some from carbon-monoxide poisoning caused by indoor use of generators and charcoal grills. Most of them could not read the equipment warnings, says Van Dinh-Kuno, executive director of the Refugee and Immigrant Forum of Snohomish County.

"Eighty-five percent of the people who needed to go to the oxygen chambers [because of carbon-monoxide poisoning] spoke another language at home," Dinh-Kuno says.

Various groups in the county now are working on ways to better serve people who aren't English speakers.

Snohomish County's ethnic makeup is changing rapidly. In the 2000 census, 19 percent of the county's residents were nonwhite; by 2005, that figure had increased to 24 percent.

For much of that 24 percent, English is a second language, making them a vulnerable population, said Dinh-Kuno.

Emergency-service providers may offer help, warnings and updates, but if they're all communicated in English, many residents might not get the message.

"Right now, 17 percent of the people in our area speak another language at home," Dinh-Kuno says. "If anything happens, are we thinking we pick up 83 percent and let the other 17 percent go?"

The Red Cross of Snohomish County, among others, doesn't plan to do so.

Brochures, fliers and the Red Cross Web site have been translated into a handful of languages — instructions on how to give first aid, survive an earthquake and create a family emergency plan are all available in Spanish, Russian, Korean, Arabic and Vietnamese.

But the problem is with more than just information, says Mar Tobiasom, of the Snohomish County Red Cross. Some residents don't know what a smoke alarm is, and for them, being reminded to change the battery isn't helpful.

Dinh-Kuno agrees.

"Some of the people from the ESL [English as a second language] populations, they don't even read and write in their own language," she says, adding that agencies trying to reach non-English speakers should stick with short, direct messages.

During the spike of hot weather last summer, Snohomish County Department of Emergency Management sent out press releases in six languages, papering area news outlets with Bosnian and Arabic and Russian in an effort to communicate to residents. There were hiccups — how would newspapers print in an Arabic font? Korean characters? — but on the whole, the department reached its goal, says Director John Pennington.

Dinh-Kuno says Snohomish County's efforts are good but fragmented.

"The system we have right now is in little pieces," she says. "We need to organize a network."

Pennington says his department is trying to do just that with its outreach efforts — making overtures to community leaders and groups with ties to residents who may need translation help, and designing disaster plans that factor in other languages.

Dinh-Kuno says that many ethnic communities cluster, and that's a boon to communication. In case of emergency, getting the word out to non-English-speaking residents could start with just one phone call.

"We need to find core people, and they know exactly where [their community] lives, and they will go out there and begin contact and sharing information," Dinh-Kuno says.

Pennington says he wants to go further and work with religious communities as well — a step beyond traditional networks.

"We're really building a foundation right now," Pennington says. "The foundation is, first, ID'ing those who can speak the languages, two is who is connected in the community, and three is how can we pull those pieces together and reach out to the community."