Gov. Josh Green signed several bills related to health care and behavioral health into law Thursday — aligning with his administration’s social health care model, which encompasses not only traditional health care, but other societal issues like poverty alleviation, homelessness and more.

The four bills Green highlighted at the ceremony, held in his office at the state Capitol, addressed issues ranging from health care accessibility to workforce development.

“Health care has evolved. Health care is not simply about having doctors in the emergency department, admitting someone into the hospital,” Green said at the ceremony. “Health care is about the wellness of society, the well-being of people often on the streets, how do they get the care that they need? How do we actually find a way, in a civilized fashion, to care for those who don’t even have any chance to find their way back into a healthy state?”

Senate Bill 3139 will create a crisis intervention and diversion services program within the state Department of Health — intended to expand current services that redirect people with mental health disorders from the criminal justice system into appropriate health care facilities.

“What this bill does is it provides additional mental health care services and care to our homeless communities,” Green said. “We have created institutions to back this up. It replaces law enforcement with mental health and caseworkers.”

The bill also defined a “mental health emergency worker,” who can be called by a law enforcement officer to “provide crisis intervention and emergency stabilization services and to assist in determining whether a mentally ill person is likely to meet the criteria for emergency admission and examination,” the bill read.

Green said that many times, law enforcement is “not the right way” to help these people, and that by redirecting these nonemergency cases into treatment solutions, the state’s emergency care capacity will be improved. In the past dec­ade, up to 30% of emergency room visits in the state were from homeless people with “often very serious mental illness or addiction,” Green said.

State Sen. Sharon Moriwaki (D, Waikiki-Ala Moana- Kakaako), who serves as vice chair on the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said the new program is “costly, but not as costly as a continual catch and release in the courts or the countless emergency visits to our hospitals.”

“This bill tackles the root of the problem for many homeless in crisis,” she said. “First, a one-stop center for assessment, appropriate treatment and/or referral, and community connectors for persons in crisis, and third, a coordinated training program for these first responders.”

Moriwaki, whose continuing work toward ending homelessness began in 2021, said homeless outreach agencies had already been working with law enforcement officers as a “crisis intervention team,” with officers assessing people on the street and calling upon community agencies for further assistance. The bill clarifies this procedure of calling for assistance from the newly defined “mental health emergency worker” into law.

“SB 3139 creates, in law, these crisis intervention enforcement officers and also mental health emergency workers, together, a partnership to help those in crisis,” Moriwaki said. “Importantly, they put (the) Department of Law Enforcement and the Department of Health together to train these enforcement officers so they really do help people in crisis and get them to appropriate treatment.”

Peer support specialists

Green also signed into law SB 3094, which will establish a peer support specialist working group under the state Office of Wellness and Resilience that will work to “create, develop and adopt a statewide framework for peer support specialists,” the bill read.

“This really will help people. In the context of a state that focuses on harm reduction after going through the harm of a tragedy like the Maui wildfire, it is very important,” Green said. “Embedding this in government takes us from where we are … to a place that can now really see new frontiers, which is wellness.”

Kimmy Takata, a forensic peer specialist at the Pu‘a Foundation, a nonprofit organization that supports people navigating the criminal justice system, said peer support is “not just about empathy.”

“It’s about real, tangible benefits. It helps individuals heal, build resilience and reintegrate into society as a stronger, more capable individual,” Takata said. “By investing in peer support, we’re aiding personal healing journeys and creating a more effective and humane system for everyone.”

“We’re excited to elevate this conversation and continue it across the state to implement more peer supports within our state departments and our communities,” Office of Wellness and Resilience Director Tia Hartsock said about the bill’s signing.

Workforce development

House Bill 1827 appropriates funding to the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations and Department of Education to support workforce development programs in health care. Green said $3 million will be invested into the state’s health care workforce certificate program, $1 million to equip classrooms with necessary materials for health care training, and $2.8 million for a glide-path “earn and learn” program for licensed practical nurses.

Healthcare Association of Hawaii President and CEO Hilton Raethel emphasized the need to train and retain health care professionals in the state.

“(A shrinking workforce) is one of the realities we face in the state of Hawaii right now. It’s not just about training workers; it’s not just about recruiting workers; it’s equally important to retain workers because we are losing workers every single day,” Raethel said. “Not only does (this bill) help train people in our public high schools, it also provides career pathways for people to advance.”

Mental health screenings

Green also signed House Bill 2159, which mandates the state Attorney General’s Office to aid petitioners for assisted community treatment cases and authorizes Hawaii courts to conduct mental health screenings.

“A lot of times we even have the doctors who (would) go and deliver the services, but we can’t find the legal way to help get people there,” Green said. “The ultimate civil right is to be able to be healthy and to receive services, and tragically, some people, because of circumstance, because of their illness, lose that capacity to even accept care. It definitely is critical.”

Green said at the end of the ceremony that together, the bills are meant to address various components of the social health system.

“A health care system is not something simple to run, and it’s been years in the making, but we’ve now put together a kind of a comprehensive approach to health care which I think is going to really earn dividends for our people,” Green said.