Government services for Immigrants: NYC Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs
The Deputy Commissioner for the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs spoke about the work their department does. He stressed that they are not a services department but rather they concentrate on raising awareness about immigration and the contribution of immigrants in NYC. They work to ensure that immigrants have access to all NYC services. They try to build bridges between city agencies and immigrant communities. They also offer expertise to various other city departments and organizations. The OIA also recognizes the contribution of immigrants, particularly through Immigrant Heritage Week in April
Mayor Bloomberg is recognized nationally as a champion of immigrants and often speaks out about the need for comprehensive immigration reform and to support the DREAM Act which would remove the barriers that illegal immigrant children, who have grown up here, stayed in school, and kept out of trouble, have to pursuing work and higher education.
Mayor Bloomberg has signed several executive orders that make NYC more immigrant friendly, regardless of immigration status. There were two important ones that the Deputy Commissioner covered. The first was that people regardless of immigration status should be comfortable using city services and that in terms of emergency services like police and fire, a person’s legal status is not asked and no one can be denied emergency services. The second is a language access policy that says every NYC agency must translation and interpretation services when needed.
The priorities of the NYC Mayor’s Office for Immigrant Affairs are as follows:
- to protect non-English speaking New Yorkers
- to provide every opportunity for immigrants to succeed including support for opening small businesses to create strategies and programs
- to give every adult in NYC the opportunity to learn English
- to ensure that English Language Learners in public schools succeed at not only English but all subjects
The Office of Immigrant Affairs has provided small business information specifically to Hispanic communities and will be providing small business information to the Asian communities in the future. This information is given to organizations that then disseminate it to their communities.
