December 27, 2022 |City of Lynn, City Services, From the Mayor, News, Resources

Nicholson Administration Advances Language Access Efforts in Lynn

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With Lynn’s growing diverse population, the City is taking steps to address gaps in communication with its residents. The Nicholson Administration is focused on expanding language access at City Hall to overcome language barriers and ensure that services and assistance are accessible to all residents regardless of the language they speak.

City Hall now offers a team of multilingual interpreters in the following languages Arabic, Khmer, and Spanish with the goal of hiring a Haitian Creole interpreter in the new year. The Mayor’s office is looking to further its commitment to increased communication by hiring a Language Access Coordinator to coordinate its language access efforts and provide oversight to ensure the City’s interpreters are able to assist residents and City departments successfully. This person will also serve as an interpreter and aid the City in learning more about community needs by engaging with residents at events and within their spaces, and will be hired this year with an anticipated start of mid-January.

“Improving language access will continue to take a lot of work, but is critical to our goal for a City that works for all of us. I’m grateful for the major strides that City staff have made working with our partners and appreciative of the commitment that our team has shown.”

Mayor Jared Nicholson

Additionally, the City now has bilingual directories, in Spanish and English, on every floor of City Hall with the recognition that beyond English, Spanish is the second-most spoken language in Lynn. The City has also made a commitment to continue elevating and honoring all the languages spoken in Lynn by providing language support at public meetings. This has been made possible by the acquisition of simultaneous interpretation equipment. Faustina Cuevas, the City’s DEI Officer, anticipates that the simultaneous interpretation devices will soon be available for local organizations to utilize through a rental program that will launch in the new year. 

Last year, City employees wishing to improve their own intercultural communication skills were able to sign up for a 15-week Spanish language course through a partnership with North Shore Community College (NSCC). In the spring, nine city employees successfully graduated from this program, and City Hall will be launching the program again in the spring of 2023. 

The City has also made an effort to communicate announcements and critical information in multiple languages. The City continues to improve and adapt to ensure it is communicating effectively with residents. This can be seen through the City of Lynn and Mayor Nicholson’s communication on social media and email which are often translated into multiple languages.

The Mayor’s Office worked with the City’s Parking Department to tackle a daily issue at City Hall, parking tickets. Prior to this collaboration, parking tickets were only issued in English. The Parking Department worked with the City’s ticketing vendor to enable the handheld meters used by parking attendants to issue tickets in both English and Spanish. That update is now live and the City hopes that this will assist residents in understanding parking violations and be better informed on enforcement policies. 

The City has hired a consultant to revamp the City’s website and those updates will include prioritizing accessibility and language access. That work will begin in the new year and will be a multi-year phased approach. 

“We have made a genuine effort to hear the concerns of community members and organizations on what we could be doing better in regards to language access and are thoughtfully responding to those requests,” said Faustina Cuevas. “This issue in particular is a personal one for me, as I served as my mother’s translator for the majority of my life. It is my goal that no child coming into city hall will have to translate for a family member because we will have the resources available to directly communicate with anyone that enters the building regardless of the language they speak.”

The above press release was submitted to us by Mayor Nicholson’s office.