San Francisco Language Access Ordinance Summary Report LAO 2020 - Jan 31 FINAL | Page 9

LEP Client Interactions by language*
FY 2018-2019
Cantonese: 341,824 Russian: 23,129
Mandarin: 67,797 Vietnamese: 19,092
Spanish: 327,614
Other: 12,147
Filipino: 20,042
Limited
English
Proficient (LEP)
Client Interactions*
1,000,627
FY 2017-2018
811,645
FY 2018-2019
of bilingual staff, or growing fear of using City services due
to anti-immigrant federal policies.
This year’s data demonstrates that some City departments
have made significant progress toward their goals. Critical
services departments report improved outreach to LEP
and immigrant communities, and the two departments
with the greatest increases in their language services
budgets are the San Francisco Police Department and the
Department of Public Health. These two departments have
some of the highest degrees of public contact. A proactive
approach is crucial to building greater public trust between
LEP and immigrant communities and government. When
immigrants and LEP individuals feel safe seeking services
from local agencies, all our residents and visitors benefit.
While there is still much work to do to improve language
services, it is clear that City departments understand
the urgent need. Each year’s reporting demonstrates
that departments are responding by allocating more in
their budgets for LEP outreach and bilingual services.
Deeper analysis of language access trends and one-on-
one consultations with department staff and community
stakeholders will help OCEIA further its work and develop
more useful tools. One concept emerging from this year’s
report is that, with all departments in overall compliance,
OCEIA can begin shifting the focus from the simple
provisioning of language services to ensuring the consistency
of high-quality language services across the City.
*
Data represented does not account for the following departments: Asian
Art Museum, Fine Arts Museum, and San Francisco International Airport,
due to their large international and non-resident clientele. Recreation
and Parks has been excluded because their data was not verifiable.
LAO 2 0 2 0 / 4