The Washington Emergency Management Division has launched a new online map to help local jurisdictions and the public at large figure out different languages spoken in counties and Census tracts across the state.
The goal is to help local governments know ahead of time what languages they need to have emergency messaging translated into before a disaster occurs. And, during a crisis, what languages may be in specific areas where something has happened – be it an earthquake, flood, wildfire or even a police event.
It’s state law for governments to provide life safety information in languages other than English if the limited English proficient population is five percent of the total population or 1,000 people, whichever is smaller.