Limited English Proficiency (LEP) Populations for Portland: “Factor 1” Analysis Uma Krishnan Demographer, BPS, City of Portland

Limited English Proficiency (LEP) Population | 2 Who are the “LEP”? Individuals whose primary language is not English and have a limited ability to read, write, speak, or understand English Why is it important to know who they are? Language can be barrier to accessing important benefits/ services; exercising important rights; complying with applicable responsibilities

Determining Limited English Proficiency (LEP) Populations | 3 “ Four-factor” analysis (Executive Order 13166, Dept. of Justice) provides guidance on accessing LEP:  Factor 1: The number or proportion of LEP persons eligible to be served by a program, activity or service;  Factor 2: The frequency with which LEP individuals come in contact with the program;  Factor 3: Importance of service/information/program/activity;  Factor 4: Costs vs. Resources and benefits

“Factor 1” Analysis | 4 What is “Factor 1 Analysis”? & What is a “safe harbor” provision?  The analysis involves assessing the “number” or “percent” of people over 5 years who speak English “not well” or “not at all”; important is the language each group speaks;  The analysis leads to a list of LEP languages;  The safe harbor defined as “five percent or 1,000 individuals” is the criterion used in compiling the LEP language list;

| 5 Data sources for City of Portland’s “Factor 1” Analysis:  American Community Survey: ;  U.S. Census, “Detailed languages spoken at home and ability to speak English for the population 5 years and over: ;  Oregon Department of Education (ODE): School Enrollment data;

| 6 Key Findings  The population over 5 years is 550,368 and make up 94% of the total City’s population.  103,441 persons over the age of 5 years or 18.8% of the City of Portland population, speaks a language other than English at home.  48,176 persons over the age of 5 speak a language other than English at home and speak English less than “very well”. This population is 8.8% of Portland’s over-5 population.  Spanish is the second most predominant language followed by Vietnamese in the third place.  Nine non-native English language groups with the City of Portland’s service area have LEP population of 1,000 persons or more.

LEP languages list for Portland | 7

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Questions for the group:  Should Laotian with the maximum possible value of 977 people be considered a LEP language?  How to focus attention on the Karen and Chukese communities?  How to raise awareness of “lesser known” languages? | 19