Tuesday, January 06, 2004
New York City's Bilingual Blunder
On December 23rd, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg signed a "language access bill" which requires the city's Human Resources Administration to provide oral and written translation services to non-English speakers who seek welfare and other social services.
The law requires translations into "Arabic, Chinese, Haitian Creole, Korean, Russian and Spanish." The new law is based upon Clinton Executive Order 13166, which declared language choice is protected under federal civil rights laws.
The Big Apple may have some difficulty simply complying with the Arabic translation requirement, given that this past Sunday's New York Times Magazine reported that the U.S. "State Department has all of 54 genuine Arabic speakers."
New York Congressman Peter King has introduced legislation (H.R. 300) to repeal Clinton Executive Order 13166. Would that Mayor Bloomberg had talked to Congressman King before leaping onto the bilingual bandwagon.
You can contact Mayor Bloomberg via e-mail here. The contact page is currently available only in English.
|posted by Jim on 3:48 PM|
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