AI translation tools could improve trust in public safety efforts
Karen and Steven Goddard look for what survived in the rubble of their Pacific Palisades house on Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. This was their first time back since evacuating Jan. 7. Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
Los Angeles County leveraged an AI tool to generate live translations during press conferences about wildfires and deliver critical safety information to residents more effectively.
The wildfires that rampaged through California’s Los Angeles area last month pushed close to 200,000 residents under evacuation orders from state and local officials. Escaping the fires, which burned through more than 23,000 acres, was particularly difficult for non-English speakers and those whose first language isn’t English.
In Los Angeles County, for instance, about 50,000 Asian Americans residents live in the county’s evacuation zones. More than 12,000 of them needed language assistance during evacuation procedures due to their limited English proficiency, according to a new study from the University of California, Los Angeles. The study underscored the need for decision makers to consider more equitable disaster response frameworks, including language accessibility in emergency communications.
Enter artificial intelligence. The tech has emerged as a tool for Los Angeles County officials to more effectively disseminate emergency communications to a wider range of residents. Using an AI service from translation and captioning provider Wordly, county officials offered residents live translations of daily press briefings in more than 60 languages during the fires.
Without near or real-time translations during live press conferences, “the obvious downside is that not everyone will have the information at the same time or when they need it,” said Douglas Yeung, associate director of the Management, Technology and Capabilities Program within RAND Corporation’s Homeland Security Research Division. And people who can’t understand the content immediately may not be able to ask questions and have the opportunity to have their voices heard, further limiting their ability to receive and leverage critical information during evacuation efforts.
In other cases, residents may not seek further information if government content like a press release or statement is published in English first and translated versions come hours later, or they’re likely to be dependent on nearby family or community members to assist them during emergency situations, Yeung added.
Innovative tools like AI for language translations “can help people understand better the things that they need to know so that they can get help,” Yeung said.
For agency personnel, AI technology “could make their job more easy, and hopefully, more effective,” he said. For instance, it can also improve workflows for government workers, as automated translations help reduce the need for people to manually convert and edit information for the public.
Worldly’s AI tool offers live translations by connecting an agency’s sound system to a cloud-enabled computer so they can access the company’s large language models used to translate content, said Dave Deasy, Wordly's chief marketing officer. Attendees can scan a QR code at the event to choose which language they’d like to receive information in through their personal devices.
Wordly’s translations are regularly tested and reviewed for accuracy, Deasy said. Officials can also include custom glossaries so that translations reflect local agency- or community-specific terminology, such as acronyms for government agencies.
Human interpreters are still a valuable resource for government communications, but with technology like AI, information can be disseminated faster to more people without the time and financial commitment to hire interpreters for every language and every press conference, he added. The tech can also help combat misinformation that could put residents in harm’s way, such as a social media post with incorrect evacuation routes, because they can trust the translated information came directly from their government.
As AI adoption becomes more widespread, live translations can be used for a variety of use cases beyond press conferences, including city council meetings or during interactions at government service desks, to improve agencies’ service delivery for residents, Deasy said.
Translations may even be a more palatable use of AI for communities to be introduced to compared to facial recognition tech and other more seemingly pervasive uses, Yeung said, which can help acclimate residents to government’s increasing implementation of the technology.
AI in public safety communications presents “a good opportunity” for agency personnel to “work with the public to understand … what will help them maintain that public trust while they're trying to be effective in serving the people,” he said.
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