Nisha Agarwal, the commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, says she tries to convey two important messages to the 3 million foreign-born residents of New York City: \u201cYour immigration status doesn’t matter\u201d and \u201cYou should be able to communicate with government in a language that you understand.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a wide-ranging interview with former City Council member Ronnie Eldridge for the CUNY TV show Eldridge & Co., which aired on September 17, Agarwal talks about access to justice for immigrants, Central American migrants and the mechanics of how people will be able to sign up for the municipal ID in January. She hopes this \u201ckey to the city\u201d will be issued to a million people by the end of five years. She also talked about making New York a friendly city for immigrants \u2013 and a safe one.<\/p>\n
Agarwal, the daughter of Indian immigrants who grew up in upstate New York \u2013 has long believed in pursuing and promoting civil rights for immigrants, and went to law school to go into public service. Removing language barriers was an early concern of hers, and continues to be. Visitors of the website for the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs can click on one of 34 different languages to have a web page translated, and Agarwal notes \u201cwe could do a better job across the city,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Check out what Agarwal says would \u201cchange the national conversation on immigration,\u201d and more, in this video of her interview on Eldridge & Co.<\/p>\n