Voter Assistance from English Learners
Voter Protections Newsletter Volume 3 Issue 1
August 20, 2008
FAIRFAX -- Advancement Project has sent letters to the registrar of the city of Fairfax urging him to provide sample ballots and notices at Fairfax polling places in languages other than English for the substantial population with limited English literacy skills.
Advancement Project has also asked the registrar to hire bilingual poll workers for areas with high concentrations of certain language minorities.
Printing voting materials in other languages is not required in Virginia but some communities, like Arlington, are taking substantial steps to help English learners to cast successful votes.
Advancement Project has cited census data, showing that in about 30 percent of Fairfax households, languages other than English are spoken.
In fact, Latinos comprise 12.9 percent of the county’s population and Asians make up 15.9 percent of the population. Speakers of Chinese and Vietnamese number in the tens of thousands.
The registrar has hired Spanish and Korean speakers to work the registrar’s office on Election Day. The registrar is also hiring a translation service that will be available by telephone. But Advancement Project is requesting additional measures to ease delays at the polls and ensure access to the vote.
Advancement Project has called on the registrar to:
- Provide sample ballots and notices in Spanish, Hindi, Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese and Vietnamese at all polling places.
- Hire election officers with knowledge in those languages, deploying those officers to precincts with high concentrations of those groups.
