Lorenzo Oropeza, CRLA Santa Rosa Indigenous Program Community Worker (right) and, Gervacio Peña, a Santa Rosa Mixteco community leader (center) provided testimony in Mixteco and Spanish at the hearing about the importance of providing indigenous language interpreters to the courts. They are pictured with Judge Manuel Covarrubias of the Ventura County Superior Court, Co-Chair of the Joint Working Group on California’s Language Access Plan (center).
San Francisco – February 24, 2014 – Maureen Keffer, CRLA’s Indigenous Program Director, and Lorenzo Oropeza, Indigenous Program Community Worker, participated in a Judicial Council of California public hearing to inform the development of the state courts’ first comprehensive Language Access Plan. The Council invited CRLA to speak on a panel of legal services providers to give a candid perspective about the language access needs of Limited English Proficient clients. CRLA highlighted our language access outreach to indigenous community members, featuring our “I Speak” card program. Our staff also referenced the groundbreaking study commissioned and produced by CRLA in conjunction with Rick Mines about indigenous farmworkers.
“Our message to the Council was that courts need to ensure all litigants, including indigenous language speakers, are provided with appropriate language services in every case or point of contact with the courts,” said Keffer.
There were two more hearings this March in Sacramento and Los Angeles where Indigenous Program Community Workers Antonio Flores and Mariano Alvarez further conveyed thoughts and findings to the Council and brought indigenous speakers to share their experiences with language access in the courts – or lack thereof.
Roughly 20 percent of Californians–nearly 7 million–have some English language limitations, making it difficult to access the courts without significant language assistance.