Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. While we've been talking about the police in New York City, civil rights and immigrant rights groups are suing the Nassau County Police in federal court for denying language assistance, basically translation or interpretation services when people seek help from the police, or are questioned or arrested by them. That could affect a lot of people. The plaintiff site figures from the 2020 census case they're not up on who lives on Long Island these days showing that 30% of Nassau County residents above the age of five speak a language other than English at home, 30%. Apparently, the Nassau County Police don't simply have a shortage of the language services. In some cases, at least they have a shortage with attitude.

Here's a clip you may have heard on this show's newscast yesterday of a Nassau County police officer talking to a woman at her home after she complained about harassment by her landlord.

Nassau County Police Officer: Now, this is the United States of America. We speak English in the United States.

Brian Lehrer: This is the United States of America. We speak English here. We'll see what the court says about that.

With us now, Elise de Castillo, executive director of the group, CARECEN, that's an acronym for Central American Refugee Center. They are representing plaintiffs in this case, and also Meena Roldán Oberdick, an attorney at Latino Justice, another plaintiff representation group in this case. Meena and Elise, thanks for coming on. Welcome to WNYC.

Elise de Castillo: Thanks for having us, Brian.

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Thanks for having us.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we can take calls on this in a fairly broad way. Like when have you or someone you know needed government services but didn't yet speak English? How was that experience for you? Or what makes quality interpretation when dealing with the police or any other official agency? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Call or text. Has anyone listening ever been in a position of being a child who's growing up here bilingual, and has had to be the interpreter for your parents? Very common occurrence. The lawsuit sites at least one example of a seven-year-old having to be the go-between between the parent and Nassau County Police. Tell us your story. 212-433- WNYC.

Or maybe we have some of you listening right now who do this for a living. Call in and talk about being that bilingual person helping new Americans do their business with any government agency. Tell us a story that moved you from your work, or talk about why your work is important, what situations arise most frequently, and what about those more high-stakes encounters such as we heard on the tape. Any encounter with the police can be relatively high stakes. Interpreters, tell us a story about your work. Anyone who has needed language services as a New American, or know someone who has. You tell us a story too of what was needed, and whether it was available, and how that went. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Give us a call, or you can text your story or question to that number.

Actually, Meena, I think this is more for you. Can you talk about the clip that we played and give us the context of where that was and what was happening there between that police officer and that woman?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Absolutely. In 2020, one of our plaintiffs, Ms. A, called 911 to report an illegal eviction. For weeks, her landlord had been harassing her and her family, and increasing the harassment. Finally, she did what anyone would do. She tried to seek help from the police. The interpreter had spoken Spanish with her on the line. She assumed that the officers who would arrive to the scene would know that she would need an interpreter. That was not the case. Two officers from the Nassau County Police Department third precinct arrived on the scene, and very quickly refused to assist her. As we heard on the clip, they explicitly told her, "This is the United States, we speak English here."

Our client knew that that was not true. She knows that she has rights to assistance from law enforcement, and rights to interpretation. She subsequently tried to go to her precinct on multiple occasions and file a civilian complaint against the officers for their mishandling of the incident, their failure to provide her help, and their pejorative way in which they spoke to her. Even though she tried to go to the precinct to file a complaint in person, she was turned away and was never able to file such a complaint.

Brian Lehrer: As far as you know, that cop was never disciplined in any way by his superiors for talking to that woman that way, even though it was on tape and it came to light.

Meena Roldán Oberdick: That's correct.

Brian Lehrer: Elise, are you alleging in the lawsuit that people needing language services get hit with that kind of attitude frequently in addition to any simple shortages of the services themselves? Or do we take that as a bad apple story that you're not trying to establish a pattern or practice of in court?

Elise de Castillo: Brian, we're actually not focusing all that much on the attitude. I think the real issue here is the lack of access to the services, period. Nassau County has a federal obligation under federal law to provide these services to any resident of Nassau County, or any person who's engaging with the police that is limited English proficient or expresses a desire to receive services in the language other than English. That's the focus of the lawsuit because quite unfortunately, the plaintiffs in this case, these are just some of the cases that have come to our attention.

We are confident there are many, many more cases like this across Nassau County that even we as organizations who work with the community every day aren't even aware of.

Brian Lehrer: Tell us more about the lawsuit. It's against Nassau County's police department filed in federal court. What's the claim, and why Federal?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Sure. On Monday, we filed a federal civil rights lawsuit challenging both Nassau County Police Department and Nassau County's longstanding, and continuing failure to provide adequate language assistance to limited English-proficient community members. The lawsuit is brought in federal court primarily because the court claims arise under federal law, including Title 6, as well as violations of the US constitution. Specifically, the complaint alleges that Nassau County Police Department fails to comply with federal and state law, that it does not enforce its own written language access policy. It does not investigate or punish officers who failed to provide language access services. Instead, it denies assistance to thousands of people in the moments where they are most vulnerable and afraid.

Brian Lehrer: Meena, you cite not only federal civil rights law, but also an executive order from 2013, I see, by the Nassau County executive. I believe it was Tom Suozzi, Democrat at the time, who later went on to Congress. What was that executive order, if you're familiar?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Sure. You previously mentioned that Nassau County is a linguistically diverse population. That has been the case for many years now. More than a decade ago now, advocates and residents got together to recognize that this growing linguistically diverse population was facing countless barriers when it came to accessing the county's programs and services. Thanks to their sustained advocacy over that time, 10 years ago, Nassau County's executive office, then under the Executive Mangano, issued two executive orders requiring all county agencies to provide language access services, including competent interpretation and translation. As our lawsuit details, unfortunately, since that time, we've seen little meaningful improvement on the ground in practice.

Brian Lehrer: What remedy are you seeking in court, Meena?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: We are seeking injunctive relief. We are asking the court to order the Nassau County Police Department to provide competent translation and interpretation to implement appropriate training on treating linguistically diverse community members for department members, to develop adequate supervisory procedures, to drastically improve its data reporting and investigations, and very importantly, to implement a system to monitor, supervise and discipline officers who fail to comply with the law.

Brian Lehrer: Elise, I see you didn't file this against both counties on Long Island. Does Suffolk County do a better job than Nassau? Did we lose the Elise?

Elise de Castillo: No, I'm still here. I can't speak to that specifically, but we do know that we have worked very closely as members of coalitions and with Nassau County Police over the past 10 years. It has been a very active effort to try to help them, encourage them, get them to follow their own policies, and despite our best efforts, a decade has passed, and so we haven't seen any change.

Brian Lehrer: Talking about a lawsuit filed against the Nassau County Police Department for not offering language services that are required, the plaintiff say, under federal civil rights law and under Nassau County Executive Order that dates back to 2013 when residents of the county who need language services, translation, interpretation, have dealings with the police. We're talking with leaders of two groups that represent the plaintiffs, the Central American Refugee Center, and Latino Legal Services, also affiliated with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.

212-433-WNYC is our phone number. 212-433-9692. You two are ready for a little bit of pushback? Here's Don in Queens. You're on WNYC, Don. Hi.

Don: Good morning, Brian and guests. You're speaking to someone who's bilingual, comes from a bilingual family. I'm Cuban, and now I'm Cuban American. It was insisted by my grandmother that I learn to speak the language, English language, proficiently. We are asking, or people are coming into America who think what we're doing is wrong. They don't seem to want to assimilate. We don't have folks coming into the country assimilating. We're giving things away. We are not asking you. We're demanding. We're printing driver applications, other federal applications for people to come into America, but they don't seem to if you're from another country.

Brian Lehrer: Don, let me ask you a follow-up question, then we'll get our guest responses. Why do you see it as a lack of interest in assimilating, as you put it, rather than services that are helpful to people to assimilate as they become new Americans?

Don: Because I've worked with two gentlemen that told me that they didn't want to do business in America or in a situation with anyone that didn't speak their language. You understand? They went to a bank, and they said, came back to me, "Oh, I'm not going to deal with that particular branch anymore because they don't have anybody to speak my--" "Hey, my friend, you are now in America. America. You welcome everybody, but now you're not asking anybody to participate. They want you. Okay?" They want me. I can address them in both languages. I'm only going to speak English right now.

Brian Lehrer: I understand. Don, I'm going to leave it there. I appreciate your call very much. Meena, you want to take that?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Sure. Absolutely. Thank you, Don. Firstly, I'll have to respectfully disagree with the premise that to be an American, to assimilate to American culture, requires speaking English or speaking English well. Our organization, Latino Justice, was founded 50 years ago to challenge the treatment of Puerto Ricans, particularly in New York, but also nationwide, as second-class citizens. Something that a lot of Americans don't remember is that Puerto Ricans are US citizens by birth. Puerto Ricans are American. Puerto Ricans speak Spanish. One of the big challenges for Puerto Ricans historically, has been lack of accessing to exercising their rights as citizens in voting, in schools, in employment, because of linguistic discrimination, because of discrimination based on the fact that they speak Spanish.

I think this also raises another important point that--

Brian Lehrer: Are you reinforcing his point in a certain respect by saying you don't think people who come here from another country, or US citizens who come to the mainland from Puerto Rico, have a responsibility to learn English at all?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: No, I wouldn't say that. I think many people do take it upon themselves to learn English. I think it's incredibly one of the biggest challenges they face when coming here. The immigrant communities that we work with try very hard, and they try very hard for the sake of their children. I also come from an immigrant family, and my Spanish is really bad because my family wanted us to assimilate and speak English. I think that it's not about whether or not people want to. I think it's recognizing that that takes time. That takes perhaps a generation for a family to become truly English proficient, and there's no excuse, in the interim period, for denying them access to basic rights and services.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take another call. James in North Brunswick, New Jersey, you're on WNYC. Hi, James.

James: Hey, good morning. I worked in social services my entire career, and it usually happened at the end of the day. To the agency's credit, they did mandate that a Spanish-speaking person stays till the agency is closed, and all the people are out. When you have a very young child, and that child is translating for their parent, and the parent gets bad news from the worker that they're not going to get any help, and the parent becomes so upset, that child has no way to deal with that. They're in a stun state. When they leave the agency, they forever change from that experience. To the agency's credit, they mandate that people who are bilingual stay.

The other side of the coin is, and I think Stan inadvertently proves the point, is that there's some kind of hierarchy between Spanish-speaking people. One Spanish speaker will disparage and look down at the other one, for whatever reason. In my experience, when you're done with the interview, coming off angry, saying that, "This is an [foreign language] or [foreign language]," you're just trying to get over. No, you're trying to get some help. Everybody makes a judgment when somebody comes through the door, and that's absolutely wrong.

Brian Lehrer: James, thank you very much. At least, James mentioned the heartbreaking situations where children have to be the interpreters for their parents, or covenant agencies, and at the worst possible times, on occasion when they're getting bad news, as he put it, I mentioned in the intro, the story that you cite in the lawsuit of a seven-year-old, or at least in the press release about the lawsuit, I haven't read the filing, of a seven-year-old having to serve as an interpreter for a parent. Do you want to tell that story or react to James in any way?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: James, I'm really glad you bring that up because it is such a critical issue in this situation. I can speak to another case. We have a client who has a 16-year-old child with developmental disabilities, who was raped. Of course, when her family found out, the first thing her parents did was reach out to the police, as any parents would do. Unfortunately, in that situation, because the rape victim spoke English, and parents felt more comfortable speaking in Spanish, Nassau County PD actually denied language access [inaudible 00:18:11]. They were essentially putting the rape victim, a minor child with developmental disabilities, in a position where she was going to have to interpret for her parents to talk about her own rape.

Brian Lehrer: Because there were no language services available that were provided by the agency.

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Right, exactly, because the language service is available. They were just denied to this rape victim.

Brian Lehrer: Dolce in Nassau County, where this is all taking place. Listeners, if you're just joining us, we have a few more minutes talking about the lawsuit filed against the Nassau County police for allegedly failing to provide required interpretation and translation services to people who need that help when they have dealings with the police. Dolce in Nassau County, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Dolce: Hi. I was born and raised in Washington Heights, so I'm Dominican American, but I did not know English when I went to grammar school. I did learn quickly because I needed to. I went to Columbia Presbyterian Hospital once as a child around eight years old, and the doctor announced, "Does anybody speak English and Spanish?" I went up there as an eight-year-old and said, "I speak English and Spanish." The doctor was looking at me like, wow. Anyway, he says to me, "Ask the patient, does she have a headache." I said to her in Spanish, "[foreign language]?" I didn't know the word for headache, so I said, "Headache." Make a long story short, I became a doctor, and I was an emergency room doctor at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital.

In answer to the [inaudible 00:19:55] police officer, this is the United States of America.

I am an example of the United States of America. I now am also a doctor at a union clinic for laborers. My father was a maintenance man, went to up to fifth grade. My mother was a factory worker and went up to third grade. I work at this union laborers' clinic because it brings me joy. I'm the only one that speaks Spanish as a physician, I take care of people like my parents, like my family. Because I'm an adolescent medicine specialist, I also take care of their children who are now going to college, and they don't have to interpret for their parents, so I can get the full history of what's really going on, without any embarrassment or people keeping info from me, because I can communicate with them. This is important. This is the United States of America, and in the end, after the first generation, we do learn the language. Go ahead, sir.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Dolce. I'm going to leave it there. Thank you very much.

Meena, it's so interesting. A lot of the listeners right now didn't hear the beginning of the segment where we played the clip that was recorded of a police officer saying to a woman who had called the police at her home with respect to alleged harassment by her landlord. She didn't speak English, and she got berated by the police officer who said, "This is the United States of America. We speak English here," when he couldn't understand her. Meena, when we hear that clip and then we hear Dolce's call, this is as big as different definitions of what it means that we're the United States of America, isn't it?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Yes, absolutely. I think that really goes to the point we were touching upon earlier, which is that we live in a linguistically diverse United States of America. That has always, always been the case, and I think it's incumbent upon us all to honor that. That's a critical part of ensuring public safety for all. It's not just about the treatment of individuals now, like Dolce's story illustrates beautifully. It's also about the treatment of future generations, the sons and daughters who will be a part of the fabric of our communities, 10, 20, 15, 30 years from now.

Brian Lehrer: Can I ask you, Elise, before we run out of time, how much the recent surge of asylum seekers to our area is affecting the demand for language services in Nassau County? We hear much more about the surge of people arriving in New York City, but I'm sure that spreads out to the rest of the area. What are you seeing in Nassau County with respect to increasing demand, and what do you think the county's responsibility is to meet that demand at the language services level?

Elise de Castillo: Yes, Brian, undoubtedly there are asylum seekers arriving here on Nassau County as in New York City, but I think that there is so much focus on asylum seekers right now, that we actually often miss the larger point, and that is that Nassau County's population growth for years has been driven by immigrants. Of course, understandably, as our county becomes more linguistically diverse, the county has a legal obligation to ensure that the services that it provides are provided in a way that meets the needs of all of our county's residents. The fact is this isn't a choice, it is their duty under federal law.

Brian Lehrer: Just as a matter of demographics, can either of you tell us how much of this need is for Spanish-speaking Long Islanders in particular, and how much for people speaking other languages? I was talking to an immigration lawyer off the air the other day, and I was told that a growing need now is for people who speak indigenous languages because an increasing number of the asylum seekers now are not Spanish speaking, but those from indigenous populations in Latin America who speak several different indigenous languages. That lawyer works in the city, though. Are you seeing that on the island, or what would you say about the diversity of the need for language services in Nassau County at this point?

Meena, you want to take that, if you know?

Meena Roldán Oberdick: I'll actually defer to Elise on that for now. I unfortunately don't have the statistics in front of me, but that's absolutely right. We are seeing increases in indigenous populations throughout the immigrant community.

Brian Lehrer: Elise, anything briefly on that?

Elise de Castillo: Yes, of course. The primary language spoken by most immigrants on Long Island is Spanish, but we also have significant populations that speak Hindi, that speak Chinese languages, that speak other languages. Of course, as we see immigrants arriving from different parts of Latin America, understandably there is going to be an increase in the need for translation services into indigenous languages. The fact is, Nassau County, in addition to having this legal obligation, they also have the resources to be able to provide these services, so be it a person from Bulgaria or South Africa or the Moon, if the person speaks another language, Nassau County has to provide the services in that language.

Brian Lehrer: There we leave it with our two guests, Meena Roldán Oberdick, who's an attorney at Latino Justice, and Elise de Castillo, executive director of the Central American Refugee Center. Thank you both very much for joining us.

Meena Roldán Oberdick: Thank you very much.

Elise de Castillo: Thanks, Brian.

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