Language access is planned one encounter at a time: a hearing, a discharge conversation, an IEP meeting, a safety briefing. The legal trigger, the languages involved and the right channel differ by sector, and a plan that treats them alike fails somewhere. This guide sets out what courts, hospitals, schools and employers in Texas each need, how to match each conversation to phone, video, on-site interpretation or document translation, and how public entities can buy through TIPS and BuyBoard contracts. It closes with the 26 Texas locations in this series, including our Austin, Dallas and Houston offices.
Title VI still applies after federal agencies withdrew their guidance and narrowed their rules
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 bars discrimination based on race, color or national origin in any program that receives federal financial assistance. What changed in 2025 is the guidance around the statute, not the statute: the Justice Department rescinded its 2002 guidance on serving people with limited English proficiency, effective March 21, 2025, while stating that recipients must still comply with Title VI and its implementing regulations, and that denying language assistance can be evidence of national-origin or disability discrimination in certain circumstances (Department of Justice notice, April 15, 2025).
Other agencies followed. The Department of Homeland Security rescinded its 2011 guidance effective July 14, 2026, while noting that language assistance may be required in certain circumstances (Department of Homeland Security notice, 91 FR 43108). The regulations narrowed too. The Justice Department amended its Title VI regulations to eliminate disparate-impact liability, effective December 10, 2025 (Department of Justice final rule, 90 FR 57141), and the Departments of Health and Human Services and Education did the same effective July 24, 2026 (HHS final rule, 91 FR 46746; Department of Education final rule, 91 FR 46733).
For a Texas program the practical reading is this: the guidance a plan may have been built on is gone, and the Title VI regulations reach less than they did. The rules that name language directly still stand, from the court interpreter statute to Section 1557’s rule for health programs and the IEP rules, each covered below, and a plan now has to stand on them and on its own documented reasoning.
Texas courts need licensed interpreters, and the state’s free remote service covers only short hearings in four languages
Texas Government Code section 57.002 sets the rule for state courts. When a party files a motion or a witness asks, the court must appoint a licensed court interpreter for a person who can hear but does not comprehend or communicate in English, and a certified court interpreter or certified CART (real-time captioning) provider for a person with a hearing impairment; the court may also appoint one on its own motion (Government Code section 57.002). Article 38.30 of the Code of Criminal Procedure covers criminal cases, and the Judicial Branch Certification Commission licenses court interpreters (Texas Judicial Branch, language access).
The exceptions turn on county size and language. A court in a county under 50,000 people may appoint an interpreter who is not licensed. In a county of 50,000 or more it may do so only for a language other than Spanish, after finding that no licensed court interpreter within 75 miles can interpret in it, and certain counties on the Mexican border and the Gulf Coast have a separate exception (section 57.002; Civil Practice and Remedies Code section 21.021).
The license has two levels. A Basic license covers justice courts and municipal courts that are not courts of record, and a Master license covers every Texas court (Texas Municipal Courts Education Center, court interpreters). A license is held by an individual interpreter, not by a company, so a court or a law office buying interpreting should ask which licensed interpreter will appear rather than whether the vendor is licensed.
The state’s free remote option is narrow. The Texas Court Remote Interpreter Service covers Spanish, French, Portuguese and German, for short, non-contested, non-evidentiary hearings of typically 30 minutes or less, such as arraignments, magistrations, plea and bail hearings; the court pays the phone charges and supplies the equipment (Texas Court Remote Interpreter Service). Contested hearings, trials and every other language need licensed interpreters sourced separately.
County plans show how courts staff this in practice. Travis County’s civil courts updated their procedure in 2025: licensed interpreters whenever possible, remote interpreters on the courts’ Zoom platform where that is reasonable, and pay of $100 an hour in person and $65 an hour remote for the interpreters the court schedules, each with a two-hour minimum (Travis County civil courts interpreter procedure). Harris County’s County Courts at Law adopted an expanded plan in 2024; its civil courts provide interpreters on request to people found indigent, and the expansion depends on county funding (Harris County Courts at Law).
Two procedural details trip up parties. A foreign-language document offered in a Texas court needs a qualified translator’s affidavit or unsworn declaration giving the translator’s qualifications and certifying accuracy, under Texas Rule of Evidence 1009 (Children’s Immigration Law Academy), and Bexar County requires civil litigants to bring an official written translation prepared in advance at their own expense (Bexar County plan). Municipal courts may also require the request in writing: Arlington Municipal Court’s Local Rule 5.5 at named dockets (Arlington Municipal Court local rules), and Plano Municipal Court’s Local Rule 5.3.5 by written motion no later than the party’s initial appearance (Plano Municipal Court local rules). Our legal language services are built around these rules.
Federal courts follow a different rule. The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, which sits in Waco among other cities, appoints interpreters only for defendants and defense witnesses in proceedings the United States brings; in all other proceedings the parties provide and pay for them (Western District of Texas interpreter FAQ). The federal certification exam covers Spanish only (U.S. Courts, federal court interpreters).
Hospitals serving wide regions need interpreters on staff and remote coverage behind them
Texas trauma centers draw patients from far beyond their county. University Medical Center of El Paso describes its Level I trauma center as the only verified Level I center in a region it measures in hundreds of miles (University Medical Center of El Paso). A patient who arrives from that far away brings whatever language the region speaks, whenever the injury happens.
The workable model pairs staff interpreters with remote coverage behind them. Driscoll Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi reports that more than 40% of its patients and families speak Spanish as their only primary language; it keeps staff Spanish interpreters on site on weekdays from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., covers other times by phone and video interpreting, and arranges American Sign Language through a deaf-services partner with advance notice (Driscoll Children’s Hospital, interpretation services).
Volume shows why staff alone cannot carry it. Parkland Health in Dallas provided more than 1,992,300 interpretations in fiscal year 2022, in more than 240 languages, with about 120 medical interpreters, and its language services director says bilingual staff cannot interpret anything involving clinical information (Parkland Health).
Federal rules set the floor for health programs that take federal funds. Section 1557’s language rule requires a qualified interpreter, free of charge, when interpretation is needed. It bars making patients bring or pay for their own, relying on an adult who is not a qualified interpreter except in an emergency or at the patient’s private, documented request, and relying on a child except as an emergency stopgap, and it requires a qualified human translator to review machine translation of critical text (45 CFR 92.201). The notice that this help is free goes out in English and at least the 15 languages most spoken by Texans with limited English proficiency, including on consent forms and discharge papers (45 CFR 92.11). HHS says the rule remains in force apart from provisions on gender identity that a court vacated (HHS notice, 91 FR 32887).
For a hospital planning its own coverage, that gives four questions to answer: which languages are frequent enough to justify staff, which times and languages the remote service must cover, how sign language and rarer languages are arranged ahead of time, and which bilingual employees are tested and trained before they interpret. At Waco Family Medicine, 72% of the bilingual employees who completed a training program qualified as medical interpreters, an observed result at one center (Baylor University). Our healthcare language services are HIPAA-compliant and handled by linguists who know medical terminology.
Schools and resettlement programs need the family’s exact language, down to the dialect
School districts are the clearest example of language breadth. Garland ISD offers spoken interpretation in over 75 languages, including American Sign Language, in person, by phone or by video, free to families, with written translation in Spanish and Vietnamese; families can ask for an interpreter at IEP meetings and for a full translation of IEP documents. The district’s home languages run English 52.5%, Spanish 37.4%, Vietnamese 4.2%, Amharic 0.9%, Arabic 0.7% and Malayalam 0.7% (Garland ISD, translation and interpretation services).
Two rules set the floor for special education. Federal regulations require a school to take whatever action is necessary for parents to understand an IEP meeting, including arranging an interpreter for parents whose native language is not English (34 CFR 300.322). Texas adds a written record: when a parent’s primary language is not English, the district must provide a written or audiotaped copy of the IEP translated into Spanish if Spanish is the parent’s primary language, and make a good faith effort to provide one in any other primary language (Texas Education Code section 29.005).
Regional figures show how far the mix runs. Statewide, the Texas Department of Transportation ranks the top five non-English languages as Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese, Arabic and Korean (TxDOT statewide language assistance plan). English language learners make up over half of Dallas ISD’s students (Dallas ISD), and Pasadena ISD serves more than 17,000 multilingual learners from over 30 linguistic backgrounds, led by Spanish, Vietnamese, Arabic and Urdu (Pasadena ISD). The mix also moves: Frisco ISD told its board in November 2025 that 77 languages are served across the district and that, for the first time, Telugu had passed Spanish at the top of the list (Community Impact report on Frisco ISD).
Resettlement adds languages that a language name alone does not capture. Karen has three main dialects, S’gaw, East Pwo and West Pwo, which are mutually unintelligible, and a Karen client who is comfortable speaking Burmese with a Karen interpreter may be very uncomfortable with a culturally Burmese one (Karen refugees from Burma, webinar for torture-treatment programs). Rohingya has no formally accepted writing system, so spoken interpretation matters more than written translation for those families, and a Dallas-Fort Worth needs assessment found children often interpreting for their parents (ILAD refugee needs assessment).
The same care applies across the state. Austin ISD’s most common home languages after English include Pashto and Dari (Austin ISD). Denton County’s transit authority identifies Hakha Chin speakers in its Lewisville service area (DCTA language access plan), and Midland Memorial Hospital’s 2022 needs assessment records language barriers for Hakha Chin and Burmese residents (Midland Health community health needs assessment). In Amarillo, Catholic Charities of the Texas Panhandle resettles new arrivals and Amarillo ISD runs bilingual, ESL and migrant education programs (Catholic Charities of the Texas Panhandle; Amarillo ISD). The planning consequence: record the language and the dialect at intake, in the family’s own words, and match the interpreter to that record rather than to the country of origin.
Border trade and plant floors run on documents and safety instructions people can act on
The scale is industrial. The Port of Laredo handled $354 billion in imports and exports in 2025, with about 14,000 commercial trucks crossing its bridges daily (Laredo Economic Development Corporation). The McAllen-Reynosa metro area has about 2.4 million people and over 145,000 advanced-manufacturing employees (McAllen Economic Development Corporation). About 24% of El Paso County residents have limited English proficiency, and the county organizes its own language access through the iSpeak915 initiative it adopted in 2022 (El Paso County, language access). Even a port authority keeps a plan: the Port of Brownsville offers volunteer Spanish interpreters on request, other languages through telephone or internet interpretation, and language identification cards (Port of Brownsville language access plan).
Documents carry the risk at the border. The pedimento is Mexico’s official customs entry document; a licensed customs broker or authorized customs representative files it, it records tariff classification, customs value, taxes and duties, and it may reference invoices, certificates of origin and permits (BorderFlow, what is a pedimento). Translation supports the invoices and certificates a broker relies on; it does not replace the broker.
On the plant floor the obligation is federal and specific. OSHA’s Training Standards Policy Statement says an employer must instruct its employees using both a language and a vocabulary the employees can understand, and that if an employee does not speak or comprehend English, instruction must be provided in a language the employee can understand (OSHA, Training Standards Policy Statement, April 28, 2010). That reaches well beyond the border. The Greater Houston Partnership describes the Houston Ship Channel as home to the world’s largest petrochemical complex (Greater Houston Partnership, energy). In the Permian Basin, many operators have required new workers to complete the Basin United safety orientation since January 2022 (IADC, Basin United required for new hires), and a Midland training provider delivers it in English or Spanish (Basin United training in Midland).
Commercial work covers negotiations, HR and safety sessions, and customer contact in the languages a workforce actually uses. Public-sector work covers resident-facing services, emergency notices, and the documents an agency has to make available in other languages (government language services).
Match each conversation to phone, video, on-site interpretation or document translation
The channel follows the conversation: how far ahead it can be planned, whether the people involved need to see each other, whether a document is the product, and what the law requires in that setting. The four descriptions below are Global Interpreting’s own service statements.
Phone interpretation for the conversation that could not be scheduled
HIPAA-compliant phone interpretation connects you to an interpreter in over 300 languages within seconds. It fits a front desk, a hotline, a triage question or a broker’s clarification, and any exchange that needs an interpreter before anyone could book one.
Video interpretation for conversations that need visual cues
Video interpretation is available 24/7 in over 50 languages, adds facial expression and other visual cues, and is the remote route for American Sign Language. It fits a telehealth visit, a discharge conversation, a school meeting held online, and any exchange where the interpreter needs to see the room.
On-site interpretation when being in the room matters
On-site interpreters are scheduled ahead for appointments where being in the room matters. Court appearances that call for a licensed interpreter, IEP meetings, safety briefings on a plant floor and negotiations across a table are the usual cases. Legal work goes to interpreters trained in legal terminology, or to certified court interpreters where the proceeding requires one.
Document translation when the document is the product
ISO 9001:2015 certified document translation pairs each file with a translator working in that subject area, and an independent reviewer checks the result before delivery. Court filings that need a translator’s affidavit, the vital documents a county plan lists, IEP paperwork, safety manuals and the invoices and certificates behind a customs entry all belong here.
Texas public entities can buy language services through TIPS and BuyBoard contracts
Two cooperative contracts give Texas public entities a familiar route. TIPS Contract 260105, titled Technology Solutions, Products, and Services, is held through The Interlocal Purchasing System, a department of Texas Region 8 Education Service Center and a national purchasing cooperative. Its scope covers over-the-phone interpretation, video remote interpretation, on-site interpretation, ASL and sign language support, written translation, localization, document formatting support and language access program support. Eligible TIPS public entities and qualifying nonprofit members may be able to use awarded contracts instead of running a separate solicitation, depending on their own procurement policies and applicable law.
BuyBoard Contract 799-26, Oral Interpretation and Written Translation Services, was awarded by The Local Government Purchasing Cooperative and The National Purchasing Cooperative for an initial term of June 1, 2026 through May 31, 2027, with two possible one-year renewals. The awarded scope is oral and on-site interpretation, written translation, telephone interpretation, video remote interpretation and sign language interpretation.
Both routes depend on eligibility. Confirm your membership, your internal requirements and your legal authority to use a cooperative contract before you reference either one. The contract pages set out the steps, and a program that is not a member can still submit the request form.
Five steps to a language access plan a Texas program can defend
A defensible plan is one that shows its reasoning. These five steps draw on the court, hospital, school and government documents cited in this guide.
- Count the languages you actually serve. Start with your own encounter records, then add public data: a district’s home-language figures (Garland ISD), a city’s count of residents with limited English, such as Grand Prairie’s 31,661 (City of Grand Prairie Title VI plan), the election languages a county must offer, such as Vietnamese and Chinese in Harris County (Census Bureau Section 203 determinations), and the state’s ranking of non-English languages (TxDOT). Record the dialect where a family names one.
- Map each encounter to its legal trigger. A court appearance calls for a licensed interpreter once a party or witness asks (Government Code section 57.002); a federally funded health program must offer a qualified interpreter (45 CFR 92.201); an IEP meeting needs an interpreter for the parent (34 CFR 300.322); a safety briefing has to be given in a language the worker understands (OSHA).
- Assign a channel to each encounter type, using the four descriptions above, and write down the exceptions: which hearings the state’s free remote service can take (Texas Court Remote Interpreter Service) and which conversations must happen in the room.
- List the vital documents and who translates them. Hidalgo County’s plan calls for translating vital documents when many residents with limited English are affected (Hidalgo County LEP plan), Bexar County requires civil litigants to bring official written translations prepared in advance (Bexar County plan), and Austin’s emergency plan names the 12 languages the city translates into during an emergency activation, from Spanish to Pashto, Burmese and Tigrinya (City of Austin emergency language access plan).
- Set the rules staff follow and keep the record. Hidalgo County discourages family and friends as interpreters, generally bars minors and forbids requiring people to bring their own interpreter (Hidalgo County LEP plan); Austin’s policy allows only trained and qualified interpreters, not family, friends or children, and requires a written waiver when a client insists on using a family member or friend (City of Austin language access policy). Log each request with the language, the channel and the outcome, so the plan can show what it did.
Language services in the 26 Texas locations in this guide
This guide is the first in a series that accompanies our location pages. Each page below covers the local institutions, languages and services for its area:
- Dallas-Fort Worth: our Dallas office, Arlington, Denton, Fort Worth, Frisco, Garland, Grand Prairie, Irving, Lewisville, McKinney, Mesquite and Plano
- Houston and the Gulf Coast: our Houston office, Pasadena and Corpus Christi
- Central Texas: our Austin office, Killeen, San Antonio and Waco
- South Texas and the border: Brownsville, Laredo and McAllen
- West Texas and the Panhandle: Amarillo, El Paso, Lubbock and Midland
For a city outside this list, the Locations page lists every office and service area.
