Spokesman Review. Opinion. Letters. October 20, 2024

League of Women Voters provides translations

The Spokesman-Review’s coverage of election information on issues, candidates, voting history and processes is greatly appreciated. For 104 years, the nonpartisan League of Women Voters has similarly dedicated its organizational strength and resources to empowering voters and defending democracy.

For the 2024 general election, the Spokane League is finishing a special project supporting the newest voters in our region – naturalized citizens whose first language is not English.

The state and county do not provide translations of election materials in languages spoken by relatively small numbers of residents, so in 2020 and again in 2024 a committee of League members has raised funds to pay for translations of election and voter education materials into nine languages: Spanish, Russian, Ukrainian, Arabic, Vietnamese, Chinese, Dari, Swahili and Kinyarwanda.

Additionally, our members are working with several community organizations that support Spokane’s immigrant and refugee community by conducting workshops to inform new citizens about how elections work in Washington state. Part of this outreach involved partnering with graphic arts students at Eastern Washington University to produce pictorial flyers, zines and videos depicting what one does when a ballot arrives in the mail.

We also are honored to acknowledge another partner, Spokane County’s Elections Office, which has linked to all the translated ballots recently posted on LWVSA’s website. We invite the public to share this information with anyone who might find it helpful. The link is my.lwv.org/washington/spokane-area/translated-resources.

Elaine Harger

Spokane Valley