Courts Running Out Of Interpreter Funding

Another place civil justice is getting rationed: court interpreters. The New York Times has a major story that many states are running out of money, in “… places like Ohio, Kansas and Illinois, where immigrants speaking many different languages have settled in recent years, the courts struggle within financial constraints to meet their obligations under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which requires them to provide interpreters in all civil and criminal proceedings. In Ohio, for example, the most recent survey of local courts showed that spending on interpreters had increased to $1.1 million in 2010 from $55,000 in 1998, fueled by profound demographic changes.”

The NYT also reports that “Jocelyn Samuels, acting assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said states had ‘a civil rights obligation’ to find the money to cover the growing costs of court interpreters. Pleading poverty, she said, “cannot insulate state courts systems from compliance.”

It’s interesting that much of the attention is given to criminal, but that civil cases are also part of the Act. Read the NYT story here: As the Demand for Court Interpreters Climbs, State Budget Conflicts Grow as Well