| Oakland,
where waves of Asian and Latino
immigrants have settled in the past
two decades, unveiled a 24-hour hot
line Wednesday that gives residents
information on 500 city services in
five different languages.
City
officials believe Oakland is the first
in the nation to offer an automated
phone system in more than two
languages. Two years ago, the city
became the first in California to
adopt a law that requires hiring
bilingual staff and translating city
documents.
The
$300,000 system, called Cityline,
offers information on topics from
business licenses to library cards to
composting in English, Spanish,
Cantonese, Mandarin and Vietnamese.
A
fax-on-demand service, which was not
working Wednesday but is expected to
be working today, can provide
documents from demolition permits to
domestic partner registration forms in
any of the languages, and callers can
leave messages for certain city
departments.
"It
really opens up Oakland city
government and recognizes the fact
that in a community like Oakland,
where we celebrate our ethnicity as
well as our diversity . . . we have to
ensure citizens have total and
complete access to government,"
City Manager Robert Bobb said at a
City Hall news conference conducted in
five languages.
The
hot line -- (510) 238-2222 -- is an
outgrowth of the "equal
access" policy passed by the City
Council in April 2001. The policy
required bilingual hiring and
translation services once the city's
population of limited-English speakers
of a certain language surpassed
10,000.
Of
Oakland's nearly 400,000 residents,
44,400 speak only Spanish, 34,000 only
Chinese and 8,657 only Vietnamese,
said Deborah Liu, the city's equal
access director.
The
policy required that the city hire
staff bilingual in Spanish and Chinese
for public contact positions, from the
police and fire departments to senior
centers. So far none has been hired
because of a hiring freeze, Liu said.
Of
nearly 5,000 city workers, there are
395 Cantonese, Mandarin and Spanish
speakers in front-line positions, she
said.
Councilwoman
Jean Quan, who speaks Cantonese, said
the hot line will not take the place
of hiring but will be "one small
step." Without information
available in other languages,
"nearly 40 percent of our
residents can't participate in city
government," she said.
In
addition to the five major languages,
another 120 languages are spoken in
the city, Liu said.
"There's
a big fear in the community of coming
to City Hall and trying to ask their
questions," which the phone
system should help alleviate, she
said.
San
Jose has a similar automated phone
tree in English, but has not expanded
to other languages because the city
also has a call center where a live
clerk can connect to AT&T
translators for help in any language,
said Tom Manheim, San Jose's public
outreach manager.
San
Francisco, which adopted an equal
access ordinance in July 2001, does
not have a single automated phone
line, but many large departments have
phone systems in more than one
language, said telecommunications
engineer Judi Soto. The recycling
line, for instance, is in English,
Spanish, Cantonese and Tagalog. The
policy requires all telephonic
greetings be in English, Spanish and
Cantonese.
In
Oakland, Liu's office also has
translated 400 city documents into
Spanish, Chinese and Vietnamese, from
business tax bills to housing
information to search consent forms
used by the police department.
Carl
Chan, president of the Chinatown
Chamber of Commerce Foundation, said
the efforts are helping in the Chinese
community, where residents used to
receive letters from the city they
didn't understand and could be fined
for such things as late payments.
"I
think this is a wonderful tool,"
Chan said of Cityline. "Every
time when they call in, they'll know
who to talk to and how to turn a
problem into a solution."
The
Oakland system is navigated most
easily with the help of a four-page
brochure available at city buildings,
through the fax-on-demand service and
online at www.oaklandnet.com.
Chronicle
staff writer Rachel Gordon contributed
to this report. / E-mail Janine DeFao
at jdefao@sfchronicle.com.
|
