Multilingual Initiative (MLI) Committee Meeting Minutes

September 13, 2005

Program Owners

• Stevens, Sharese, MLI Program Owner
• Correa, Marilyn, MLI Program Analyst

Designated Federal Official

• De Jesus, Inez E., Analyst, Acting DFO

Committee Members Present (These attendees count for quorum)

• Fireman, Jerald- Edmonds, WA
• Havey, Dorothy-Lincolnville, ME
• Irizarry, José-San Juan, PR
• Kreisler, Steve-Potomac, MD
• Lawler, Mary Ann-Dearborn, MI
• McKenzie, Clifford-Del City, OK
• Meissner, Joseph-Cleveland, OH
• Perros, Theodore-Washington, DC
• Richardson, Lovella-Knoxville, TN
• Sosa, Iris- Fontana, CA
• Twomley, Bruce-Juneau, AK, Chair

Committee Members Absent

• Curol, Helen- Lake Charles, LA
• Jones, Delford- Griffith, IN
• McElroy, Paul (excused)-Winston-Salem, NC

TAP Staff

• De Jesus, Inez E., Analyst
• Odom-Russell, Meredith, Note Taker

Welcome
Chair Bruce Twomley opened the meeting by welcoming everyone.

Roll Call (quorum has been met)

Review Agenda
There were no objections to the proposed agenda

Approval of Meeting Minutes
June 24 and 25, 2005, July 12, 2005 & August 9, 2005 Minutes were approved by the committee.

Program Owner’s Report
Ray’s leaving is causing a burden. There has not been a replacement for him as of yet. Trying to contact Stevens and Correa may become challenging but they are there.

Project Team Reports:
Team 1: Needs Assessment Team
At the face-to-face meeting in D.C., the team came up with a one page survey to assist the needs of Asian’s in the territory of the committee members, which included Oklahoma, Tennessee, Louisiana, and Indiana. The survey was sent to the stakeholders in Tennessee and Oklahoma; Louisiana was deleted because it did not get there before the hurricane and the committee felt it could not be administered properly under the circumstances. There is an organization in Indianapolis that initially expressed an interest and requested a short report from Twomley by way of introduction to the project. There has not been any communication with the organization to know of their status. The surveys are due to Sharese Stevens by September 30, 2005. The committee hopes to have some results by October 15. The Memphis Group Shareholders asked to extend it’s time to October 15, and hopes to have a report ready for the face-to-face Annual Meeting in Washington, DC by October 30th. Stevens recommends allowing everyone to extend their date until October 15, this gives more time to make connections with the Indiana folks. Translated copies of the survey since they are in Vietnamese, Chinese and Korean will be emailed to the committee in the English version.

Team 2: Education Team
Correa will set up a conference call with Team 2 to decide how the course will be tabled out for the LITC clinics and all other individuals. Hopefully the gentleman that contacted the committee at the Tax Forum might be able to provide feedback at the conference call. Perros worked on the final report which is very concise and clear, it’s a matter of deciding who is going to deliver the course.

Team 3: LITC Communication Team
A survey was created for the LITC Directors. This survey will be submitted to each local LITC. Alan Goldberg approved the survey and informed the LITCs the survey would be done. All of the surveys should be in by the end of September in order to come up with a complete report. This will establish a central clearing house to contain all of the Non-English material that is used to educate LITC clients. A suggestion was made to put all of the surveys together and send one email with all of the surveys attached. Toni Cross is looking at having all of the reports in by the end of the month to have a compiled report by the end of September.

MLI Annual Report
Twomley will produce an Annual Report for the committee as a whole. This will be done by having final reports by each of the teams and each of reports will stand alone and be presented as the body for the MLI Annual Report. Each of the teams and their chairs should provide an account of what the committee wants to be presented to the rest of TAP. These reports should be sent in by the end of next week.

News from Staff
Inez thanked the members that are not returning for their time with TAP.

Action: All Pending Action Items are fine.

Action/Assignment Review

• Chair- will prepare the TAP MLI Self-Assessment report.
• Committee Members- each team leader will be submitting their respective reports to the chair.
• Staff/Program Owners-Marilyn Correa will be having a conference call in respect to Team #2.

Closing/Assessment

• Meeting adjourned 3:20 PM
• The next meeting will be the TAP Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, from November 2-5, 2005.

*These minutes were approved by the TAP MLI Issue Committee on November 15, 2005 by consensus (via email).