In an increasingly diverse society and global marketplace, the ever-expanding importance of language services should come as no surprise. The need for language services, however, isn’t tied solely to doing business in overseas markets, but also right here in the United States. The need for professional foreign language translation and interpretation services has been skyrocketing, and not just in the “traditional” multi-ethnic hubs of California, Texas, and New York, but has also seen explosive growth in rural America, and with a rapidly growing demand for certified legal interpreters.
Today, roughly 21% of the U.S. population speaks a language other than English at home (more than 64 million people). While the majority of these speakers of another language also possess an advanced level of English, approximately 8% of the United States population is considered to be Limited English Proficient (LEP). In some states, such as Texas and California, this percentage is much higher, with more than a third of Texas residents over the age of 5 speaking a language other than English at home (with Spanish representing 85% of those).
To ensure that non-English speakers or LEP residents have meaningful access to services, both state and federal governments have passed laws and issued executive orders to ensure that LEP and non-English speaking individuals have equal access to services, particularly legal services. This is where certified legal interpreters come into play, although the overwhelming volume of cases has placed an increasing burden on the existing interpreter resources.
In the State of Texas alone, FY 2018 saw more than 1.5 million civil cases filedstatewide, which included a significant number of cases where interpretation services were required. In addition to the large number of cases in state courts in Texas, the state is also on the front lines of immigration-related cases on the federal level, with more than 132,000 immigration cases pending so far in FY 2019, second only to the State of California.
While it is true that Spanish legal interpreting makes up the vast majority of the legal interpreting requests in Texas, the linguistic demographics have been changing radically over the past decade, with growing populations of Vietnamese, Chinese, Tagalog, Korean, Urdu, German, French, and Hindi speakers. In total, more than 160 languages are spoken in Texas, and both the federal and state courts must be prepared to support legally-mandated interpreter support for any language that comes before the courts.
With increased immigration from Central America over the last decade, this issue has become even more pronounced, as many would-be immigrants and refugees from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador often speak extremely low-density languages such as K’iche’ or Mam, with only limited proficiency in Spanish. And, while the courts and Department of Justice are required to provide qualified legal interpreters in any language, they are often unable to do so, increasing the backlog of cases and length of time that refugees are kept in the court systemuntil an interpreter can be located and scheduled.
One solution that some courts and the Department of Justice have turned to is the use of over-the-phone (OPI) interpretation services. However, while it can at times be easier to find an interpreter in some of these low-density languages via the telephone, these interpreters often are unable to meet the stringent certification and/or licensing standards required or are unavailable when the judge places the call at the beginning of a hearing.
In the end, whether in the Texas courts or the federal immigration court system, professional interpreters are in greater demand than ever and face an overwhelming volume of cases, particularly in lower-density languages. Furthermore, while the Texas Office of Court Administration has a strict process for licensing its interpreters, the federal courts and Department of Justice require a much lower threshold of competency and testing for its legal interpreters which jeopardizes the legal rights of refugees and asylum seekers.
Fortunately, local Texas-based language service providers, such as Translation Source, are working tirelessly to recruit and vet qualified legal interpreters to meet this demand and assist LEP and non-English speaking migrants to communicate and navigate the legal system effectively.
