U.S. Government Launches Spanish-Language Web Site

October 17, 2003

Federal agencies, services more accessible to Spanish speakers

WASHINGTON · A federal agency on Thursday launched a Spanish-language version of FirstGov -- a government-run Web site that provides information about official programs and services -- as part of President Bush's plan to use the Internet to improve access to government information.

FirstGov en Espanol (www.espanol.gov) is a centralized collection of major federal agencies' Web pages translated into Spanish, including the U.S. Postal Service, the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services and the Department of Education. It is designed to demystify the way government works and to encourage Spanish speakers to seek information about living and working in the United States, officials said at a news conference announcing the site.

FirstGov en Espanol "is an easy ... portal for those who wish to access federal and state information in Spanish," said Stephen Perry, administrator of the General Services Administration, which developed and manages the new Web site. "[The Web site] came out of the president's mandate, and it's an obvious void that needs to be filled."

The Spanish-language site serves as a gateway to Web sites for 55 federal agencies and 37 states. Each agency listed there decides which information to translate, based on demand, said Teresa Nasif, director of the GSA's federal citizen information center. Because the site takes users to pages written in Spanish, not all content available on the English-language FirstGov will be available there as well, she said.

So far, more than 100,000 translated government pages are accessible from the site -- including the entire Web site for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Nasif said. Most translation was done in-house by bilingual employees of the Small Business Administration, she said.

FirstGov en Espanol "shows how easy it has become for [Spanish-speakers] to make their way through the labyrinth of government information," Nasif said.

A goal of Bush's initiative was to make agencies function more efficiently through the use of technology. A demonstrated interest among the nation's more than 37 million Hispanics to get government information in Spanish helped to spur development of the new site, officials said.

"It's difficult for many immigrants to access government services ... in a language they understand," said Alexander Acosta, assistant attorney general for civil rights. The new program means those "who speak Spanish at home will have access to [information] they need, irrespective of language barriers."

The site follows the same organizational structure as FirstGov by arranging information according to four main sections and lists of commonly accessed topics.

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