Louisiana Supreme Court issued the following announcement on Oct. 23.
Louisiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson announced the creation of the first-ever statewide Language Access Plan (LAP) for Louisiana’s courts. By a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) in partnership with the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), the Louisiana Supreme Court has committed to work with lower courts in the Louisiana judiciary to phase-in a language access program that will provide free language assistance services including but not limited to providing court interpreters to some 120,000 limited English proficient (LEP) individuals in all state court proceedings and operations.
“The LAP is the result of several years of discussions with the U.S. Department of Justice. It was drafted in consultation with members of the LAP Stakeholder Committee, which included judges, court administrators, interpreters, and other judicial stakeholders,” Chief Justice Johnson said. “We appreciate the hard work of the Stakeholder Committee who I believe produced an excellent plan to move Louisiana forward in this critical area.”
The purpose of the LAP is to provide effective language assistance services to limited English proficient individuals in order that they may effectively gain knowledge of and participate in judicial proceedings, programs, and services that they otherwise would not be able to utilize or understand. Additionally the plan includes a template to be used by each state court to develop its customized court language access plan.
The LAP, the realization of the Court’s commitment to addressing language barriers, employs a “phased-in approach” with extensive input from the Supreme Court’s Language Access Stakeholder Committee (“Stakeholder Committee”), the Supreme Court’s Language Access Coordinator, and Judicial Administrator, as well as the DOJ. It includes stipulations on providing LEP individuals with translated paper and electronic notice about how to access interpreter services, how to provide translated paper and electronic court forms and information, explains the process for each court to collect and report interpreter use information to the Supreme Court, and how to create a process for language access complaints. Further, the Language Access Plan shall be a dynamic document which is periodically reviewed and updated to reflect new best practices in the judicial system and society.
Original source can be found here.