By Bruce Nolan, The Times-Picayune. May 07, 2010, 5:27PM
Vietnamese fishers facing an economic catastrophe from the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico are in double jeopardy — facing lost fishing income and isolated by the language barrier from government and oil industry programs to keep them informed and send them temporary relief.
No one speaks Vietnamese at a Delaware-based contractor hired by BP to accept claims applications from fishers, and there are few or no Vietnamese speakers in BP’s program to hire fishing vessels to fight the spill. Even U.S. Sen. David Vitter acknowledged that he has no Vietnamese speaker on his staff to field emergency complaints from Vietnamese fishing families. He promised to correct that soon.
All those revelations surfaced Friday when 200 Vietnamese fishers from Texas to Florida gathered Friday at Mary Queen of Vietnam Parish to be briefed on the spill by BP and state and federal officials — and to tell those officials they are out of the communications loop.
The Rev. Vien The Nguyen provided live translation between briefers and audience.
Vitter and U.S. Rep Anh “Joseph” Cao addressed the families, with additional briefings from officials from the Coast Guard, EPA, Small Business Administration, the city’s emergency operations office and BP, among others.
Joel Waltzer, an environmental lawyer who has worked with the Vietnamese community on landfill issues after Hurricane Katrina, urged the group to organize as it did in those days and press for useful, accurate information in their language.
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