Speaker 0: And Jeremy won't tell you this, but some give you one of your first jobs. It's why you're here. Okay. Thank you for that. Moving on, we're going to take the next item, which we're going to do, because there's a lot of folks here. And so we want to move it up is going to be the language access item. I think that's probably the next largest group of folks here. So can we please, madam, quick read that.
Speaker 1: Item 23 is communication from Councilmember Urunga, Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilwoman Price and Councilman Andrew's recommendation to receive and file a status update on the implementations of the city's language, access and hearing disability policies.
Speaker 3: For.
Speaker 5: Councilman Jauregui of Florida.
Speaker 12: Thank you, Vice Mayor. First of all, before we begin, I'd like to have a staff report, but I just want to thank the council members who signed up with me for this very important item here. And let's have a step before we move forward.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council members.
Speaker 4: We do have a staff report, a quick report on the language access program adopted by the City Council.
Speaker 5: Our Health and Human Services Director Kelly Collopy.
Speaker 4: Will provide that. Kelly.
Speaker 6: Good evening. I'd like to introduce Katie Borders.
Speaker 4: She's the head of our equity office and she'll be ending the report tonight.
Speaker 7: Good evening, honorable mayor and city council members. My name is Katie Balder. Since my pleasure to share our Language Access Policy update with you and the members of our community this evening. I'll start by providing a quick background, an overview of the policy, give you an update on our progress, and discuss some ways we'd like to improve language access services moving forward. We're looking for the clicker.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 6: One moment.
Speaker 3: Okay, great. Thank you. You're not here. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 7: In 2013, City Council adopted the Language Access Policy and amended it in 2015 to address the use of children as interpreters except for in cases of emergency. This past January 2017, the Language Access Policy transitioned from development services to the Department of Health and Human Services under the Office of Equity. The policy establishes standards and procedures for providing language access to city services, programs and resources in the top three languages spoken in Long Beach, which are Spanish, Combi and Tagalog. This includes coordination of a bilingual staff directory and training for bilingual staff so that they can provide interpretation and translation services as needed. The policy also includes over the phone interpretation recorded outgoing messages for city phone lines, interpretation at public and community meetings, and translation of city documents. I wanted to note the interpretation for American Sign Language is also available for public meetings through our city's ADA coordinator, although it is paid for by each department and not through language access . In order to implement the policy consistently across all departments. A language access policy kit or lap kit was created to train city staff and promote language services. The lap kit consists of a brochure for staff which you should all have a copy of that details all of the services available. A quick fax card is a handy reference guide and a stand up counter display also referred to as the I Speak Cards, which lists the top ten languages in L.A. County. The 30 minute lap training provides city staff with an overview of the policy, the services and how to access them. In fiscal year 2017, we conducted 18 staff trainings directly reaching 441 employees. As of right now, we have seven more trainings scheduled for the next couple of months and we invite any city staff to request lap kit trainings from us to ensure that all residents who speak a language other than English can easily access city services. We also maintain a bilingual staff directory of 647 city staff who receive bilingual skill pay when they provide translation or interpretation. City staff who provide, who receive bilingual skill pay are required to view two training videos that address appropriate techniques and ethics for interpretation and translation, as well as the use of children as interpreters. The bilingual staff directory is updated every six months and is available on the city's intranet. In cases where interpretation is needed and a bilingual staff member is not immediately available. We also provide over the phone interpretation. Our vendor language line provides us with 24 seven access to over 8000 professionally trained interpreters who speak more than 240 languages . In fiscal year 2017, language line provided the City of Long Beach with interpretation for 321 phone calls in nine different languages. And this little graph just shows the top five languages for which language line was used, including more than 75% of the calls in Spanish, followed by Carmi at 16% and Vietnamese at 3% and Tagalog at 2%
Speaker 8: . And Mandarin.
Speaker 7: When someone calls the city department, they're able to access assistance in their preferred language using our translated outgoing phone messages. Currently, there are 77 city phone lines that have menus translated in English, Spanish, Kumai and Tagalog. We also provide on site interpretation by requests for public meetings in Spanish and Tagalog. And in fiscal year 2017, we provided interpretation at 68 public meetings for 15 different departments and city council offices. In addition to on site interpretation, we also help ensure that city documents are translated in Spanish, come in Tagalog and in fiscal year 2017, we translated 199 documents for 21 city departments and council offices. The up services I've highlighted tonight, the everything from staff trainings, requests for document translation and public meeting interpretation and even the processing of each of those invoices is managed by one part time staff working less than three quarters time. This can present some challenges in responding to requests in a timely manner, but we continue to work hard to ensure equitable access to city services for all of our residents. As we look to the future of language accessibility in this city, we see several opportunities ahead. We strive to reach more staff through training and leadership development to advance consistent implementation of the policy. We will also continue to work with our community partners to increase resident awareness of the ability to receive city services in their language and improve the quality of these services. And given this given some of the challenges we face with our resources in the next year, we would also like to use technology to better automate and track requests for interpretation and translation, as well as find ways to reach more staff through training videos. So that concludes my report. Kelly and I are available to answer any questions you may have.
Speaker 12: Thank you. One of the main reasons why I brought this forward is because obviously in a couple of years in 2019, we're going to have a new civic center. And I would like to see some of these approaches use that when we get to the new civic center. Very pleased to see that we're making great strides in the program and that we also want to include hiring and translation supporter services as well. When we get to the new a new city hall and start doing that now, what are the other reasons why I brought it forward is that we are somewhat deficient in some areas and we need to look at those and especially when it comes to hearing impaired because of of people needing or wanting to participate in city hearings and commissions. And it would be an amazing opportunity to have these services available for them. One of the things that I want to ask, however, is that when we get to the new city hall, what type of technology are we looking at when it comes to the civic center that the new chamber, the open access areas of who that are for, for community people to walk in. It's, for example, customer service areas that are that are coming in there. What's going to be available for them?
Speaker 3: I the Office of Equity, we don't have that information. Okay. But we can.
Speaker 4: Try to bring back the.
Speaker 12: Overview of the association already working with the public works on this. So.
Speaker 0: Each evening. Councilmember Murang'a members of the City Council.
Speaker 4: So, yes, we.
Speaker 0: Are looking at a very robust approach to the new civic center.
Speaker 4: Which will include hearing loops.
Speaker 0: For the hearing impaired and also language access in four languages that have been adopted by this council. The system that we're looking to implement in the new building.
Speaker 4: Will allow us for better.
Speaker 0: Translation services, better access in multiple languages with with one device. So we we believe that we have addressed it and will be happy to provide.
Speaker 4: More details and report back to this council.
Speaker 12: Great. In terms of translation services, what's the process or procedure that the city uses to identify these these vendors? Early language providers.
Speaker 7: So we put out a request for bids and in an informal bid, quote, process to obtain quotes from the vendors. And we received several quotes and we ended up choosing one that was both the best price as well as the best quality we have worked with out of state vendors in the past that were unable to fulfill many of the requests we had for interpretation. So we currently use goodwill links for interpreting, and when they're unable to fulfill a request, we are a vendor associated. Murphy.
Speaker 12: Just out of curiosity, what's the current skill paid for an employee to provide many more services?
Speaker 7: I don't know, but I'd be happy to get back to you with that information.
Speaker 12: Okay. I recall it was like a dollar at the time when I was when I was doing it back in back in the day. At this point, I guess I like to go out to the public to see if some of their questions that they have or any comments that you might want to have regarding this this matter.
Speaker 0: As a public comment, please come forward if there's any public comment. Please come forward. Okay. I'm going to close the speakers list. So I have and we have a lot going on till tonight. So I will be closing the speakers lists after. The woman in red or. Hold on a second. Is anyone else getting in line? Okay, that's that. Okay, so everyone's in line. Speaker's list is closed. That's it. No more. Go ahead.
Speaker 7: Okay. Hello and good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Alicia morales. I'm the program manager with the Long Beach Immigrant Rights Coalition, also a member of the.
Speaker 11: Language Access Coalition. And my colleague.
Speaker 6: As well to Silva. My name's Samarasinghe. I'm business navigator at United Cambodian Community. I am also a partner. We also are part of the Access Coalition. Yes. So on behalf of the Language Access.
Speaker 7: Coalition, we really want to thank you for your continued support on this item and for this policy. It has been a great policy win for us and for the community at large that worked on this back in 2013, 2012. And we're here to continue to ensure that our residents can continue to access city resources in the city and without language being a barrier. Right. We want to commend all of you for the work that you've done and moving forward. We want to make sure that there are still equitable practices in place for our EP residents because as we heard, there's still some things that we can improve on. So since this item passed in 2013, we have continue to monitor the ALP policy or the language access policy aside and sorry, let me trace back. So we've been monitoring the policy and recently we conducted a survey of 100 community residents and they kind of gave us some feedback as to where they think some improvements can be made. So while we're encouraged by the city's progress and in particular, we want we really want to recognize the work of the Office of Equity and the leadership of Councilmember Rank on this item. We do have some recommendations we want to share.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Alicia. As my colleague mentioned, we have several a recommendation to share and we also have you also have a copy of it as well. So number one would be multilingual Senate. We realize that the new city hall only have a Senate in English, but we would like to see combined Tagalog and.
Speaker 7: Spanish in it as well.
Speaker 6: So our also community member also recommended and interpreter and booths, but in the new city city hall as well. So second would be quality of the interpretation. Community member recognize the quality of interpretation often in accurate and also choppy. And we strongly recommend the city to hire a stronger interpreter who can translate effectively. Number three on the single phone line, we want to ensure the new city four nine that is being developed include Spanish, Khmer and Tagalog and also requesting interpreter. We also recommend a 24 hour advance notice when it comes to requesting interpreter 48 hour is not enough. So also increase outreach about the language access, policy and benefit. And we recommend consistent language access policy implementation across the city department. Okay. We also recommend completion of translated.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much. Once again, can you just give me a little more time? I know that comes from a language point of view here. And to give a little more time, we've got to wrap it up. Okay.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Thank you. And I saw what's my as well as multi-language front desk stuffing and finally companion why don't documents translation. So as you will see you will hear from some of the our community member directly today and we will we hope to have them share their thoughts and opinions.
Speaker 0: Thank you so much.
Speaker 6: Thank you.
Speaker 0: Next speaker, please.
Speaker 9: Thank you. Hello. My name is somebody and I am a resident of the sixth district. I think Mayor Garcia and the council men and women who are here to listen to me, I really do feel that enough is not done for the Cambodian community. And I feel it's it's very sad for me.
Speaker 0: However, I do I am hopeful.
Speaker 9: With this policy that is that it is a stepping stone to help the community. I hear so many stories of Cambodian people being scammed because they don't speak English. And so they it's it's sad. And I feel that having a positive policy like this, which will provide signage and interpreters for the community members, it will definitely help them have better lives and let them know that the city of Long Beach cares about the Cambodian community because we are often invisible. We our voices are here. Often are not heard enough. And I feel that enough is enough. And I feel that.
Speaker 0: A.
Speaker 5: Policy like this represents.
Speaker 9: The city's commitment to the Cambodian community. And as a Cambodian American, I appreciate a policy like this. And I you know, I can't speak for every Cambodian in the city of Long Beach, but I know that this is a powerful policy. And thank you.
Speaker 0: Can speaker, please.
Speaker 6: I have been a Westside parent and through the Long Beach Unified School District, various programs. And one thing I'm concerned about right now is Webster Elementary has died of budget cuts is what we're being told, that they have 5050 Spanish to English in kindergarten, but the east side has 9010, which means our students will start middle school with their language fluency later, then students on the east side. So Webster also has one dual emerging class in the morning and one in the afternoon.
Speaker 3: So I don't know.
Speaker 6: Our kids are supposed to be bilingual. There were civil service programs, but e so Long Beach has more funding than we do. So there's we're.
Speaker 0: Still trying to make sure that we're talking about the language access plan.
Speaker 6: For, yeah, this is our issue. This is why you need to step up because if you don't decide that this is important, my Spanish and English kids at Webster have nobody talking for them. So if you go upstairs, Mr. Ranga, he sees it all the time. And I'm going into spaces that are totally segregated because the language in there puts us, you know, then I have to go complain and then that puts me in a position where I'm giving people to sue you all kinds of information. And I don't want to be doing that. I want to fix my school. So when I first started, Camille, they put me we were did a field trip. They put me in a Spanish by an English person with black people and white people. And then we had another bus for Spanish speakers. So we're even being segregated by a passing system or being put in different rooms. I have no idea why anybody comes to the West Side without a translator. And when you walk into that space and we see the people didn't provide a translator, we know that's not cool. We know right away you don't want us to be united. So we need to work on that. And the West Side, there should be Tory. Spanish in English is still being held behind while the East Side has double access. And they're having a meeting tonight at Webster about it with the superintendent. So they couldn't come here to talk about this. But this is the kind of stuff that we need you to hear, not just what you want to hear, but we need to get fixed because I don't need to be in a separate bus. I want to all of me is a Spanish with the translation on my head and I should be able to talk to everybody in. And we do that with all our groups that Lee and teachers. We go into a zone and we're all safe and free because we can communicate. It's about time the three groups like See Me as the Esperanza and Westside Neighborhood Association Online instead of the city, giving them special funding for a meeting. So why don't we all go together?
Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: But a notion that can be RoboCop, Seattle cyclist Marta Cota. Latinos in action. We will only sit down. Good evening. Mayor Garcia, I. My name is Martha Cota and I live in the First District. Latinos in action. I know they represent a timeless symbol up there as well as Comunidad Latina. Represent them on my record. And I see that Latinos in action represent building little leadership within our Latino community, which represents over 40% of our city and community them etc.. I live it is. The title is important. Police are aggressive, cuatro animals patrol water. They didn't want us there. Our community.
Speaker 1: Was happy to see the adoption of this important.
Speaker 6: Policy four years ago. But we have more to go. Part of the incentive to implement also supporting get to know the entire regular process to the ultrasounds for Mrs. Inmates. This compliance hearing is supposed to be a regular hearing, but it has been delayed for months now. And more important, they can also see that our standards are nutritional, and it's important that we do not delay this, that we don't delay this year after years as we continue to implement this cannot be implemented under stabilizing care significantly while we're still implementing this very significant policy. So the AMA is by my side or we go so that our reputation, the Long Beach could be an e-commerce Stradivarius that yesterday they set replica to LSU that we know and are proud of the reputation of Long Beach. The Long Beach holds is a city that is known for its adversity, and this should be reflected in our city. Structure is almost unique of money that can operate like sterling. Working on the farm was told we contest of adoption the LA police are better all would have been able to implement a year ago is implemented. Completamente. Thank you. We are a community who fought hard to for the language access and was happy about the adoption of the law program. But at this.
Speaker 1: Time we need to take.
Speaker 6: Time to support is full implementation. The animals kept on it up in season. I look as the Syrian dollar community that ecosystem to handle my lack of the services that we need to pay attention to what is working for our community and what is pushing them further away from is city services. But I to them what they are said in a commendable signal multilingualism and if the municipal item in all except the central central city. In order to do this we are recommending and multilingual signs in City Hall and in the new civic center. You know what Annapolis are? Alexis Hollingworth It will not be the interpretation authority to the La Ciudad Seriki residents for other notification of and so that also good treatment to but also currently the language access policy requires a 72 hour advance notice to request for city services of interpretation, but also to recommend that most basic water order . But we are.
Speaker 1: Recommending 24.
Speaker 6: Hours cuando silence to service your whole lot we see now that took it by only simulation we went through. Joaquin responded You really saw the solicitor rapid. I mean, when we have used the services like tonight, the city clerk's office has done a great job in responding quickly and sketch when they request quickly. So they must get positively, appropriately case those type of things. And people sustain this principle but continue almost and then the work exclusively into all of that. We saw then a source here that we feel that is feasible and appropriate, that.
Speaker 1: These types of incentives be in place so that we can continue to make our city services language.
Speaker 6: Accessible.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Samantha. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.
Speaker 6: When an assessment is thoroughly Mousavi points to the Long Beach and distrito sais must they went there and use it represent all latinos in action. Good evening. My name is Dora. I have lived in the sixth district and have lived in Long Beach for more than 20 years. It's tricky, but as I say, less mystery. A personal a no, no. CASCIO Enjoy the Arabian inflection. De la frontera el courage de de la sobre la palmar. I am here today to share with you my personal story with a particular situation where I received a ticket in front of my garage, which is located near Palmer Street . Hey, cuando bini cuando win. I carried this. Put that ticket free a la policia. Each year Medicare don't get any need unless LCD a bigger. I wanted to dispute the tickets, so I went to the police. They told me that I had to come to the city hall to pay. Jobin Erica Ria Alarcon Canan representing Espanyol Mundaring only Tania Eno, Abby and Nadia Caballero. Espanyol. I came to the City Hall with hopes of talking to a representative in Spanish and I was sent to another window and there was no one that could speak Spanish to help me there either. To make it Pagar Burkinabe. The only person that came to you that are in Espanol. I had to pay because not one person spoke Spanish. That could help me. It's there for me. I saw you come with me. You say, okay, you're not. So in our kneecap is the problem. Then a bigger survey shows us that this was my particular case. And like mine, I know that I am not the only one with a problem navigating city services. So we are saying you are listening espanyol your personal injury irresolution neither me problem either. La Macau Maneira. If we had signs in Spanish and bilingual personnel in the front, I could have come to a better solution to my problem. But as first careless pedo ketamine in consideration. Let me see. That is the la comunidad that they lost the Omar Sharif grave without the Long Beach. That is why I ask you all to take into consideration the needs of the community with those languages that reflect the city among which is best to maintain our next tangible window implement implementation though la la police are there accessible and working. Especially as you currently access LEP implementation in City Hall and build the new civic center.
Speaker 3: Which addresses.
Speaker 0: You. Thank you. Make speaker please.
Speaker 4: Yes. My name is Horace Stewart and I live in the first district here. And I just want to say a couple of things about this would be pretty short. One is, I know the Constitution pretty well and Bill of Rights and nobody is to say that English is the language of the United States. Everybody's assumed that because in fact, that was what the people who got this country going used English. That's one thing. Second of all, if we want to have a functioning democracy and in fact, we've invited people from all over the world to move to this country, then that we have to show respect for all those different areas and the different languages that people use. We know we can't do every language. I know that because we'd have to have like 500 interpreters or something probably all the time. But we can really do the ones like Tagalog, Tagalog and and Kaymer and others here, as well as Spanish and English, because this gives people an opportunity to participate within their democracy that they now live in. And I think these are important issues and important things you're working on. And I want to really say and I want to support everybody else who has spoken to say, yes, let's get this done. And especially with our new civic center, we can easily do that at that point because we will have the opportunity to move forward on that. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Speaker.
Speaker 6: Who I am. And my name is Cecelia McGinley, living in this state.
Speaker 3: And number one.
Speaker 6: I remember when this anger at many persons and thus many people, they don't receive the same, same help when they speak English. Or can they speak another language like I cannot say names about the you know, the city the city community. When they bring that many people, they will go to some kind of help and nobody to in the city hall I mean, city hall over there, when they see many people, they try to apply for help. They they never receive because they they know speak English. Oh, of course. And right there and that time, I don't know what to do. I don't say like, oh, I know everything, but now I know why they had to do that. And, and that time I was feeling very sorry about whether people also dealing with these things when the when somebody they know speak English always seeing , you know, in working for the Lumbee, these.
Speaker 3: Are.
Speaker 6: Indian are poor parents. But what I'm going to do and I'll go by, you know, the legal league when many businessmen speak English, of course, in that and nobody can tell me. Like one day somebody told me, go to the school law, what to learn, look it up. AM And I wasn't that university. I wasn't just a mes. I wasn't lonely. She call in college in many college anyway they don't teach I don't know if it's a when you we know up in that language and when they speak English they say oh I'm sorry, no, speak I don't speak Spanish. Of course, in that primitive fuck, you know, of course they know in my speak and I am not speaking in Spanish or many times I got my son or my law. I said it coming with me because I am going to fix this problem. And they said, No, Ma, you speak English, you go, here you go, you speak English, you is for you speak English. Then all you know they going to tell me also Reno's big Spanish thing going to England with Zephyr. Q And that's why I asked all my children, come on, come on with me, you know, at some point feeling bad because they all my thing years in the university. Anyway, my my language this is terrible. And they said, first of all, my children cannot go with me, help me, because I know what they're going to tell me about me. You don't have an English at all. Okay. Thank you. Support this problem. That's why. Because anyway, I don't know. The teacher. They don't teach very English. Who is? Who is? I don't know. Is because we know love without language. The language is not in is his face for us. That's why we continue, you know, in the same. Thank you very much.
Speaker 0: Oh, thank you. And last speaker.
Speaker 7: Hello, my name is Cindy Dela Cruz Brown. I'm a community organizer with Building Housing Communities Long Beach. And I live on the in the second District. I have lived in Long Beach for over eight years now. After finishing my public master's in public health at our very own CSU. I'll be I am here tonight. Thank you. I am here tonight. Represent the Language Access Coalition, who has worked hard for the last four years with community support for the adoption and implementation of the language access policy. We first want to thank Councilman Suranga for taking the lead on this key issue and also Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilwoman Price and Councilman Councilman Andrews for taking the necessary. Steps to fully implement language access. We would like to think also we really like to thank the Office of Equity for their tireless work to implement the language access policy so that we can really see it thrive in the city. We are glad to be here today to ask the questions that are necessary to sustain and improve language access. As others mentioned tonight, we have a need for language friendly services in our city. And in order for community access and in order for community access city services, we must be able to understand city services. We hope that Council will support having multilingual signage across all floors and departments, as well as in the new civic center that is currently being developed and designed. We hope that you will also consider our recommendations to make interpretation requests more accessible by requiring a48 24 hour notice to request interpretation versus 72, especially since 48 hours for council meetings. Request means requests over the weekend. We understand that tonight we've discussed 48 hours, but for city council, if we could do that for city council meetings, we recommend that this change for city council meetings be 24 hours at least if community call, in other words, of community calls for interpretation on Monday. By 5:30 p.m. they should be able to get it for the council meetings. As you continue to plan around for the Civic Center, please keep in mind to include multilingual signage, quality interpretation. A single phone line that includes language options and increased outreach to city staff as well as community members. This can be done by assessing not only city departments but also engaging Long Beach's diverse communities. We understand that implementation of the language access policy varies across various departments, which can hinder community engagement. One specific ask to complete transit is to complete transaction of all department phone lines and voicemails and provide multilingual staff for the front desk . On a personal note, I relate to those who identify with growing up being a translator for their parents. For those of us who help their parents or aunts, our grandparents navigate our city systems, health care and education, educational systems among among much more so our community could engage and get the correct information. One of those reasons, most of us one of the reasons most of us love Long Beach is because of its beautiful, rich, beautiful and rich diversity. So we want to support this in action, especially when we know that more than 44% of Long Beach residents speak a Spanish language other than English at home. Thank you. And I will pass out to the council a visual. We took some pictures just to kind of give you an idea of what each floor looks like and how on some floors there's language access fliers on some there's not. So just to show that, it should be a little more consistent. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Okay. We'll go to the council. Councilmember Councilwoman Price. Or did you. I'm sorry, did you two the second. Did you want to speak? You back your councilmember, Ringo.
Speaker 12: And would you like to? I just want to clarify a couple of points that were made that we the proposal that I presented in the letter does address the 72 hour notice. We're putting it down to 48, 24 hours, maybe a little too quick, depending on where it is. But I would want to to suggest to our city clerk and to our city staff that in those hearings and especially the city council, that it's automatic, that we provide language services in regards to at least the three major languages to my Spanish and English, obviously, so that it's not so that city council meetings are always accessible to non-English speakers. And in the in regards to the new civic center, that is that is exactly what I hope to address with this language access program and its amendments. And I also want to assure that I would I would like to see each department institutionalize language access by making it part of their budget in regards to budgeting out translation services or pamphlets or any other types of services that are that are there, as well as devoting more funds. This is an important issue, obviously, to to the community have a position is not enough and $80,000 committed to it citywide is not enough. So hopefully in the near future we can look at how we can increase those two issues right there in terms of staffing for language services as well as budgeting. So that's all I have to say at the end.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilman Andrews.
Speaker 9: Yes, thank you. Mayor Garcia, I want to thank Councilman UNGAR for bringing this item forward. You know, back in 2011, the council member, Neal, and I brought forth an idea of language access policies. The intent was to provide equal access to all of our residents and seek city services. We have come a long ways with this effort for translating materials to phone recording in various languages. I am very proud that we've continued to move forward and acknowledge the diversity in our cities. I'm eager to hear a report and all of our efforts has said place and how we can improve accessibility in the Civic Center and the future city building. And thank you again for all the other individuals who signed on with this. Thank you again. Council member Unger.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Price.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to thank Councilman Ranga for bringing this forward. I will say that I'm very happy that Councilman Ranga added the hearing loop and the hearing disabled policies into this. We have received a lot of requests in our office for the New Civic Center to be equipped with hearing loop technology. And this is an item that we've been working on for many years through our council office. So I was very happy about that and it was a great presentation. I've never met the person and the Office of Equity Office, so.
Speaker 6: Hello.
Speaker 8: Welcome. And we'd love to sit down with you, as I'm sure some of my colleagues who have also maybe not met you would love to do as well and find out what what all the other things you're working on are. And it sounds like you've been doing a lot of great work on this project. So thank you. And thank you to my colleague, Councilman Arango, for bringing this forward.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Pierce.
Speaker 7: Okay. I also want to thank my colleagues for agenda raising this. Obviously, the Civic Center is the heart of the second district here. And so making sure that this is a place that reflects our values as not only as a city, but American values, that everybody is welcome here and should be able to have access. I have a couple of questions I'd like to follow up on. One is I appreciate hearing from staff that we're looking at technology as a way to include multiple languages in the civic center and would also like to look at what that looks like in other city properties, whether it's paper signage that just says, here's how you can get hold of an interpreter or some kind of direction that allows them to know where they can go to find someone who can speak in their language to the issue of quality of interpretation. I know I've had lots of conversations around the standards at Metro, at the county level and other city or government agencies that feel like they might have interpreters that are equipped to interpret tough technology or, you know, language that we use as a council. And I know someone who's had an interpreter for for myself before. Sometimes we just talk really, really fast. And so as electeds and policymakers, we use jargon that sometimes is not everyday jargon. And so I'm curious on the standards. Are there other standards that we could be implementing into hiring our interpreters that maybe we haven't that other government agencies do? That question clear. I think we may need some time to look into that. I know that we, our vendor does have certain qualifications, that their interpreters are expected to have certain certifications. But how those compare with other government agencies and then how the quality of that is actually translated from lack of a better word into quality. Interpretation is something that we're still trying to better understand ourselves. And I think whenever you come back with this item, if we have an understanding of kind of the differences in those standards. The other thing that I've noticed from watching other interpreters and community meetings is those that do it all day long on a certain issue or dedicated to that body tend to be able to do it with more emotion and more engaging way. And so I don't know if there's something around the hours that we have our interpreters. I know that it's based on when we call and request them, but if it's, you know, guaranteeing that we have somebody that's not it's not a side gig. I know I have a restaurant owner in my district that does interpretation for the city and his full time job as a as a restaurant owner. And so just making sure that we have people that are this is their job. You know, I think our constituents, whether you agree or not on language access and how far it goes to be able to say that we can relate information differently depending on how well you speak English is is not something that I'm okay with. So I really want us to focus on the quality of the interpretation. And then I do feel like because we have supplemental agendas that come out on Friday, the 24 hour advance notice is appropriate. Otherwise, you're talking about a Friday at noon and you've got 4 hours to inform people that something's been added and then to to ask for an interpreter. And so to be clear, it's not every Tuesday. We don't always have interpreters here unless it's requested. Correct. We're still on that. That is correct. Those requests for interpretation at city council and commission meetings are handled by the city clerk, not language access policy, but those are done. So it's not a standard that they're here. Every single thing have to be requested. Okay. And so that was what Councilmember Durango had made the change, if I understand correctly.
Speaker 12: Yeah, that's correct. I would like to see language services always providing continuity night.
Speaker 7: Great. Thank you. And then I do you know, there's other the item on here around ensuring that this is something that's in all city departments. I think we in my in my district, we look at language access as our job, not as the city manager's job. So if I have a community meeting, I make sure that we are getting people to come out, that we're translating material in my office. And so I know the structure right now is here is this part of money for language access? But I want to echo my colleague's comments. And really, we need to be able to get to a place where we're structuring the funding so that everybody has a little bit to be able to work with and make sure that it's it's a much easier process and institutionalized that way versus piecemeal it the way that we're doing it now. So I guess my only friendly to this would be the 24 hour notice just because I feel like we've got enough. That's sometimes people don't find out about an agenda item until the day of you know, and making it 72 with the weekend there, it's really tough. So I'd like to ask if you would accept that.
Speaker 12: Well, you know, that would not be my call. That would be staff's call in regards to going to 24 hours. But I certainly could support that because it makes it makes it a lot shorter turnaround, obviously, if.
Speaker 7: It's something that's accessible for staff. Right. That's something that I definitely would want to see. Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 2: Thank you. I want to thank the staff for their time on this. I will say, though, there is one consistent complaint that I have received from constituents, and I've communicated this to technology and innovation, and they said that they were the ones who would be helping with this, not language access, but I'll bring it to you. There are still a number of people in my district who do not have dial able phones and cannot press one for English. They literally cannot press one on their phone. And therefore they come to my community office at Wardlow Park and say The phone consistently hangs up on me because I cannot press one for English. Why, if I press nothing, can I still not get through? This has been a over a year complaint from at least two constituents who cannot reach their councilperson or the water department or the gas department or any other department because they cannot press one because they have a rotary phone and they should not be left in the past. There has to be an option for a default that if you press nothing, you should still be able to get help. Because I believe that our seniors are also the key for us to for Spanish to give us anything. So there has to be a default. There has to be a person. And I think I've said this a half a dozen times, I've put it in writing. I don't know what else to say. I know you're not technology and innovation, but any help you could be provided. I have a man who would love to speak with you. His name is Dawn. He comes by our office regularly to communicate because he has no other option.
Speaker 7: In our preparation for this. We did reach out to Rick Barrett at TED and he did provide us with an update. I can't remember the name of the vendor, but they did set English as the default language if no button was pressed. And because we just found out about this, about I think last week, I haven't had a chance to test it, but I'd be happy to do so and report back.
Speaker 2: Please do. And if you cannot, I would like language access removed from my council line because there are people who are still disenfranchized. And when we answer the phone, which we answer the phone almost all the time, and if a message comes in in any language, I work with staff to make sure that it's interpreted properly so that I can get back to people, but that people can leave a voicemail in any language and any other time of the day. There are people in my office every day answering phones unless every single staff member is on the phone and it goes to voicemail. So thank you.
Speaker 0: Counsel, for a super Don.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I'd like to thank all the speakers for tonight for staying late with us. It's greatly appreciated and special thanks to Mrs. De La Cruz Brown for meeting with me and my office along with the Cambodian community. And I just wanted it was off topic, but I just wanted to respond to something I said here tonight that one of the speakers said they felt that we weren't doing enough for the Cambodian community. If that perception is out there, I would just encourage those people to contact your council office, contact the UTC. Suzanna We'd be glad to take those kind of calls, I'm sure. So I just encourage you to reach out. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 11: Yes. I first would like to thank the everyone here tonight. I know it's been a long night, but I want to thank all of you. Chris Miller says that the laws prevented the exception of others that energy and Latinos in action. You guys are amazing because I know that on the Long Beach Unified School District side, they work so very hard. And so what I would also ask in this is that we include maybe something where we can work with the Long Beach Unified School District. And I don't know what type of plan they have up on the top of my head, but I think it's really important that we make that synergy and connection because I do know that a lot of parents who are Cambodian speaking my speaking Spanish, speaking Tagalog need those services at the schools as well. So Councilmember Wodonga, I want to thank you very much. You this is a, you know, something I know you've been very passionate about and I appreciate the work and this is great. And Katie and Kelly, I really appreciate your work on that as well, and I look forward to continuing work with you in this regard. A few things that I've noticed in other cities is, of course, collecting data, which I think is also very important, which we're doing frequency of agencies and departments that individuals use. Translation services at commission meetings, which was included in the policy I think is so important. Everyone thinks that the council meeting is where everything happens, but there's a lot of commission meetings happening that people don't know about and I think we need to provide more accessibility there as well. And the Cambodian community and Spanish and Filipino community, I think there's certain materials that we can even see that are highly utilized. So obviously our Cambodian community has a large population. Of them are entrepreneurs and business owners. A lot of the business material I think should be readily available in Carmi. Even our health epidemics that happen, you know, I think a lot of happy is going on right now, unfortunately. And I don't know currently if we are. Do we have those in different languages at this at this time?
Speaker 10: Kelly You know, I'd have to check that.
Speaker 11: Okay. But if we don't, then I would absolutely say our health epidemics are so very important, as you know, to our communities, especially communities that are deeply affected with those issues. Housing, land use documents is a big thing. I know other cities stress that, both land use and emergency services documents. And then also I've seen testimony accepted in various languages as well. So whether that's in public or through a letter, I think just accepting it and having it translated to us may be something we can do. Overall, I'll say, you know, I'm a big believer in this. I hold bilingual budget meetings, so you can imagine what the translation looks like there because a lot of big words that even on the English side, I don't you know, it's a lot of words, huge vocabulary budget equals press supuesto you have to know these things. And it's really difficult sometimes even for me to translate into Spanish and click my head off on and off. But I want to thank all of the city employees that come to those meetings every year or every year with us because they come out with their Spanish skills. And it's wonderful to see that. And that's exactly what Long Beach needs to be. So again, thank you, Councilmember Wodonga, for your work on this.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Vice Mayor Richardson.
Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Wanted to just chime in as late as just a few things I want to just acknowledge. Councilman Ranga, thanks for stepping up on this. I remember the first conversations actually were like 2012 before the policy started, and it was some of the same people that I see in the audience and I like that their take, they're taking a step back and letting a new leaders come forward is not a lot of people that we hadn't seen leading on this issue now. And I actually see that as a part of this city council. Right. You see more leaders stepping forward on this issue and leaders who have been involved kind of stepping back and letting multiple people own it. Because I remember Councilman Andrews and Councilman Neal were two of the first signers on the item. So so I like to see the diversity and folks sort of owning this issue with all our sort of diversity on our council. But what I really want to chime in and say is there's been a real culture shift in our city. This is a great document. I remember when it was a fight just to have, you know, have a real acknowledgment that this wasn't just a sheet of paper, that when the council changes over, the sheet of paper disappears. But, you know, it has a real place now in the Office of Equity. And and I think the initial conversations were good. They were handled well with the community and development services. But we have to acknowledge they're in a completely different place now as a home and office equity is institutionalized across departments. Now, our conversation isn't about whether or not we should have a language access program. The conversations now are about how do we continue to improve it, make it better. So the one thing I would say is I don't I don't know that we got a sufficient answer on the 24 hours just yet. And here's why. I think it's it's important. You know, the city council I've seen a lot of effort on behalf of most of the council members to try not to use supplementals. And we've gotten better, but it still happens. And frankly, no, we it's unfair to ask our community to take a look at the agenda at 430 on a Friday in order to request interpretation by Tuesday. That 72 hours is it just doesn't make any sense. And it can't be a significant fiscal change to say, you know, on all items, it's a 24 hour thing. By 5:00 on Monday, you put in a request and we try to meet it. Or you could just you know, it is fiscally if that's an issue, we could say we keep the 72 hours. But in the case of of of supplemental items, those items, you you get an opportunity to request it on that item if it came in late. I just think it's a, you know, common sense thing. If there's a supplemental item, it should be treated the same way in terms of the public as it as any other agenda item. So I want to make sure that we would that that that piece that that piece is underscored and highlighted here and that we actually take some time to think it through. I would hate to have any sort of legal legal issues because we treat some some agenda items differently than others. But again, thanks was really good comments here and thank you to the community. You can tell on our voice we're a little we're a little tired. But but I know what it takes. You guys have jobs, you have things to do. And but you're here tonight because this is an important issue. So. So thanks a lot.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman. Two last comments. We're going to vote. Councilwoman Mongo.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry I was so wrapped up in my initial comment. I was reading my notes. There's also another challenge with the voice plan. When you press two for Spanish and then you're transferred, you have to go through the entire thing again and press two again. So if you're waiting on hold to talk to the water department, you might have to press two for Spanish four times before you actually can get to a live person. And I don't think that's acceptable either. It needs to carry through the system. No matter which language you push, you shouldn't have to press it over and over and over and over again. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Arango.
Speaker 12: Okay. Well, we have a long night. I want to close it out. Get it out of the grass. Yes, it's those stairs. Pataki. It's an orgy is. We're going to see those who's Comentarios can see the record out. You'll like it. But I must say, L.A., when I say programing, I just thank everybody for being here. And I appreciate all your comments and hopefully we can move forward with this. In regard to the 24 hour, I think Councilmember Pearce made a friendly amendment to quote out to 20, 24 hour notice and I accepted that a friendly amendment. So I want to move forward with making the motion with the amendment of from going from 72 to 24.
Speaker 0: Okay. There's a motion and a second question. Votes. Motion carries in 26, please.
Recommendation to receive and file a status update on the implementation of the City's Language Access and Hearing Disability Policies. Request a report in 60 days from the City Manager on the feasibility of integrating multi-language signage in the new Civic Center and any new City buildings, and request City Manager to update the Language Access Policy with regards to requesting translation services from 72 hours to 48 hours.