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Commission votes to add Spanish/English phone-tree and study interpreter support
Summary
Commission approved pursuing a bilingual (Spanish/English) message line and asked staff to identify local interpreter resources and likely costs (estimated $25–$50/hour); motion passed and will return to the agenda for implementation details.
County IT has proposed a phone-tree option that would allow callers to choose Spanish or English on the commission message line. Commissioners voted to move forward with the multilingual message line and discussed the operational implications of receiving multilingual messages.
Members clarified the need to distinguish translation (written) from interpretation (oral) and noted that interpreter services can be procured locally, including via college students in interpretation programs, at estimated rates of $25–$50 per hour. Commissioners volunteered to identify local interpreters and campus contacts to support callbacks and live interpretation when needed.
A motion to implement a multi-language message line advanced and commissioners asked the chair to coordinate with IT and to return the item to the agenda with cost estimates and a proposed operational plan for handling non-English calls.
"If we did have a message that came, money from the account that we do have would be well spent in having a Spanish speaker callback," one commissioner said, arguing for budgeting interpreter support.
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