Senator: Spanish Seat-Belt Ads a Waste of Money
| More news stories on Multilingual America |
|---|
Tim Hoover, Denver Post, January 26, 2009
Sen. Dave Schultheis says the Colorado Department of Transportation is wasting mucho dinero by running ads in Spanish that urge drivers to buckle up.
“All these ads are going to do is provide one more assimilation off-ramp for new arrivals,” Schultheis, R-Colorado Springs, said today. “Bilingualism in our buckle-up ads—just like bilingualism in our schools—will only encourage the further balkanization of our culture, reduce the pressure on new immigrants to learn English and make it harder in the long run for immigrants to become Americans.”
{snip}
Stegman [Stacey Stegman, agency spokeswoman] said the ad cost about $15,000 to produce, and the agency hopes Spanish TV stations will run it for free.
{snip}
Schultheis wondered where the accommodation of foreign languages ends.
“Can we expect a new round of PSAs from CDOT later on this year in Vietnamese, Mandarin Chinese or some other foreign language?” he asked.
Stegman replied, “If in Colorado there were the same large numbers of those populations that were unbuckled, we would do what we could to address those as well.
{snip}
Email Tim Hoover at thoover@denverpost.com.
(Posted on January 28, 2009)