The number of federal court events requiring the use of interpreters increased by 14.9 percent in fiscal year 2008, the 12 months that ended on September 30, 2008. District courts reported that they used interpreters in 282,721 events, up from the 246,037 events reported in FY 2007.
Spanish remained the most-used language for interpreters by far, with 271,155 events â 95.9 percent of the total. The number of languages requiring interpretation decreased slightly, from 115 in 2007 to 113 in 2008.
The federal judiciaryâs telephone interpreting program (TIP) continued to save money in interpreter travel and contract costs in FY 2008 while, more importantly, ensuring that qualified interpreters were available for defendants. TIP provides remote interpretation in short proceedings where certified or otherwise qualified court interpreters are not locally available.
In FY 2008, TIP services were used in some 3,330 events in 38 languages. Spanish was used in 89 percent of the TIP events.
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