Facts

In 2001, the City of Oakland adopted a groundbreaking civil rights ordinance requiring translation of key documents, hiring of bilingual staff in public contact positions when vacancies occur, translation of basic City telephonic messages provided to the public and annual city-wide monitoring of implementation for languages reaching a 10,000 person threshold, currently Spanish and Chinese. In 2008, five nonprofit organizations filed two lawsuits against the City claiming that the City had failed to enforce the ordinance or to comply with its obligations to make City government and its services more accessible to the more than estimated 70,000 Oakland residents with limited English speaking abilities.

PLAINTIFF'S CONTENTIONS:
Plaintiffs claimed that the City failed to develop and implement adequate compliance plans as required by the ordinance and failed to address additional structural barriers such as (a) a lack of consistent standards to measure compliance, and (b) a lack of a monitoring and accountability and enforcement processes that would have resulted in adequate implementation of the ordinance.

Result

The parties reached a settlement under which the City agreed to develop and provide annual compliance plans that collect and report the necessary information and to institute standards and procedures to ensure that limited English speakers have more access to City services and improved participation in city government. The City agreed to pay $400,000 in attorney fees.