Nathan Moore's Thoughts
The Raw Numbers on English Only
As Councilman Crafton agreed at the debate on Tuesday, Metro spends $110,00.00 per year on our AT&T translation service. When Metro needs translation, they dial into this service, and the government is charged a per minute rate for its use (as in, there are not armies of interpreters in various languages sitting around in Metro government drawing salary – physical interpreters are largely only found in the Health Department and the courts).
Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (along with Executive Order 13166) determines that any local government department receiving federal funds must provide its services in multiple languages, because the law says we cannot disciminate against individuals based on national origin.
Here is the useage breakdown of Metro’s interpretation services (these numbers were provided to me by the mayor’s office)
Health 41.71%
Police / Sheriff 33.13%
Juvenile / Courts 7.95%
Metro Water 6.62%
General Hospital/Bordeaux 9.43%
Nashville Career Advis. 0.71%
All of the above departments receive Title VI funds. The total is 99.55%. It appears I was more than generous with my previous estimate of 97%. This means that the passage of English Only could only affect 0.045% of the money spent, which means that Metro would save $495 per year. Or, we could just give back $250 million in federal funds each year.
The election is going to cost somewhere between $300,000 and $500,000 to conduct. This means it will take somwhere between 606 years and 1010 years to realize the nominal savings on this election.
Note now, English First has this at the top of its website
It’s about keeping Nashville united, not divided by language and encouraging immigrants to learn English and pursue the American dream. And yes, it’s also about keeping costs and taxes low, by not making city agencies operate in multiple languages.
You can call that all kinds of things, but one of the things you can’t call it is the truth.
UPDATE In The Tennessean today, Councilman Crafton continues to mislead the public regarding the money the Know Nothing amendment will save
Crafton said the amendment would require only Nashville’s boards, commissions and council meetings to be in English.
“It’s just that simple,” he said. “Anything else is not affected.”
Crafton said the proposal will encourage people to learn and use English and save the $100,000 to $150,000 Metro spends each year on translation and related services.
Except, the numbers don’t lie, and assuming you’ve read it, that’s not what your amendment says, councilman. In fact, if it only affects “meetings”, I am flummoxed as to how this amendment is going to save any money – all our meetings (per state law) are already in English.*
* except for the one where Eric Crafton, knowing English, chose to speak Japanese.
UPDATE If English Only complied with federal law, we would endanger nearly $280 million in federal funding. The figures establishing the amount of money Metro receives from Title VI can be found here .
January 10th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
[...] learned three things from Nathan Moore today. One, Nashville does not employ many physically-present [...]
January 10th, 2009 at 5:08 pm
Thank you for doing this. This is an extremely important argument (perhaps the most important one) against English-Only and needs to get more attention.
January 11th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Requiring everyone to always only speak English will not “unite” anyone. It will put up a wall of separation that discriminates against people with limited English proficiency (LEP). As a result, we’re actually LESS likely to help immigrants assimilate, and MORE likely to create an ethnic ghetto for our refugee and immigrant populations. English Only is the wrong approach, especially if you want to help people assimilate. And I’m tired of putting up with Crafton, Crisp, and Roberts and their dissembling. Enough’s enough.
January 11th, 2009 at 11:58 am
“Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (along with Executive Order 13166) determines that any local government department receiving federal funds must provide its services in multiple languages, because the law says we cannot disciminate against individuals based on national origin.”
Well, yes and no. While it is illegal to discriminate based on national origin, it is an unfortunate INTERPRETATION of that act that services must be provided in any language the individual demands. “Equal treatment” is dealing with everyone fairly in the same language. Dealing with a LEP individual in whatever lenguage the individual demands is “accommodation,” which TITLE VI in no way was intended to mandate.
I don’t think anyone objects to conducting business in various languages as a courtesy to recently-arrived legal immigrants while they learn English. However, it is problemetic when bizarre court interpretations require that governments do so for the lifetime of individuals who choose to never learn English, and whose “advocates” repeatedly file lawsuits because government agencies dare to send letters and notices in the prevailing language of the country in which we all live. If the service could be offered for two years from date of arrival of the immigrant, few would have an issue and there would be no “English Only” movement.
January 11th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
I may agree with you that some restrictions may be in order. But now, there is no “no” under the current law. The Clinton executive order was not changed under Bush, and I can bet my vital organs Obama won’t be messing with it, either.
I disagree with the following statement, however
“I don’t think anyone objects to conducting business in various languages as a courtesy to recently-arrived legal immigrants while they learn English.”
The charter amendment removes all government flexibility. It very clearly states “only” and Crafton has made it clear that it’s English or nothing. For him, there is no learning curve. He apparently mastered Japanese overnight.
January 11th, 2009 at 10:04 pm
What ever happened to our country’s traditional requirement that legal immigrants have a sponsor who will prevent the immigrant from becoming a burden to the American people? Aside from that but part of it is the overwhelming refugee situation in which our federal government regularly dumps onto American towns and cities thousands of refugee consequences of various foreign policies in which our nation usually figures.
And yes, Ganny, thanks for pointing out that many of our immigration “policy” magnets and costs stem from INTERPRETATIONS of the U.S. Constitution and other federal law, which is why American taxpayers find themselves paying for the education and feeding (school lunch and breakfast) of other countries’ children who are in the United States illegally or their parents are. These interpretations beg for challenge.
January 11th, 2009 at 10:28 pm
I found your blog thanks to Liberadio. The numbers you present are mind boggling. It appears we are paying all this money for a special election to save $495 a year, but what the issue really is about is Crafton’s ego.
January 11th, 2009 at 11:09 pm
Donna, I’m interested to learn more about the tradition of a “sponsor”. Do you have a reference for that? A link on the web or something? I’ve never heard of this.
It’s not an entirely bad idea, except for one thing: You ever see that movie, “The Godfather”? I’m a bit concerned that if a sponsor is a member of a gang, or some other kind of organized crime group, you’ll just end up creating worse problems than if you’d get Metro gov’t involved in proactively and preventatively helping immigrants to assimilate.
If you move the assimilation process exclusively to the private sector, you lose the ability to control or even predict outcomes. And instead of building bridges to citizenship, you put up walls.
I still think it’s bad policy. But I am interested in that whole sponsor tradition. Thanks.
January 11th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
I did find this… How to apply for legal permanent resident status while in the US:
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=5993da568324e010VgnVCM1000000ecd190aRCRD&vgnextchannel=4f719c7755cb9010VgnVCM10000045f3d6a1RCRD
January 12th, 2009 at 7:34 am
[...] attorney Nathan Moore reports here that cutting anything more than $495 of Metro government’s $110,000 annual bill for telephone [...]
January 12th, 2009 at 9:16 am
[...] a Lot Going on in Tennessee Politics Posted on January 12, 2009 by Aunt B. –Nathan Moore breaks down how much we’d save here in Nashville by enacting [...]
January 12th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
Thanks for breaking it down like this. I’m really glad I found your blog! The real tragedy here, in my opinion, is the fact that the numbers will extract more of a reaction to our general public than the plain and simple underlying truth of this whole matter, racism is alive and well in Nashville, TN and its latest target rests upon the primary form of communication for a significant portion of our citizens. Sad day.
January 12th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
I concur with the sadness. Nativism and the Know Nothings are back and in full effect, which is neither good for my country nor my party.
January 12th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Nobody knows how much money will be affected. But on a related note, traditionally and in immigration law, immigrants in general (there are exceptions) are supposed to be sponsored by one or more Americans pledged to keep the immigrant from becoming a burden to American taxpayers. I don’t have access to my records at the moment, but requirements/eligibility for immigration visas are somewhere on a government site. I posted it on blogs once or twice. But you can Google immigration+affidavit of support and read about it on legal sites.
There are exceptions to the affidavit of support, such as with refugees, but our immigration laws were set up so that immigrants would not be a burden to the American taxpayers. The immigrant’s sponsor, family or employer or whoever, is supposed to be paying their way, and that would include dealing with the immigrant’s language problems.
So, what we have here as we pay these escalating costs for translators, welfare, and more for “immigrants” are failures to apply our immigration laws in the cases of many, many legal immigrants and also the situation with illegal aliens, who just plop down here with demands.
January 16th, 2009 at 9:29 am
[...] The leader of the English Only effort, Eric Crafton said a couple weeks ago he didn’t know what this amendment would actually do. It has turned out that the oft cited example of a California legislature speaking en Espanol was untrue. The assertion that this will save Metro money is indisuptably false. [...]
January 19th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
[...] Conservative leader and Nathan Moore points out the estimated cost of implementing the nashville english only amendment would be $280 million in lost Federal services. Possibly related posts: (automatically [...]
January 19th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
Great post Nathan. Can you add an update that links to the $280 million data you pointed to on the news. It seems like that would more fully get your point across.
January 19th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
[...] of English Only now affirms my estimate that this amendment is costing taxpayers $500,000, but will save a mere $495 / year. If anyone reading this blog would invest in anything that would take a one thousand years to [...]
January 20th, 2009 at 3:14 am
Can you break down this $250 million number for us? Where does this federal money currently go to specifically, and how did that figure get arrived upon?
January 20th, 2009 at 8:10 am
Metro’s report on Title VI can be found here
http://www.nashville.gov/humanrelations/titleVI/pdfs/2008_Metro_Title_VI_Plan.pdf
It lists every department that receives federal funds, and the amounts. I haven’t actually typed out a list, however, though I will see if I can put it in a more user-friendly format today.
January 20th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
[...] don’t worry – we would still save $495 per year if it passes! Share and [...]
January 21st, 2009 at 8:46 am
[...] if one considers the remaining 0.45% of translation costs to not be affected by Title VI, would be a whopping $495 per year. To put this in perspective, it will take between 606 and 1010 years to realize the nominal savings [...]
October 13th, 2009 at 8:56 pm
[...] of Metro translations are for federally-funded programs, which require translation to be funded:http://moorethoughts.com/2009/01/10/the-raw-numbers-on-english-only/ English Only opponent Gregg Ramos named Nashvillian of the Year by Nashville [...]