SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News)- Last night Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced that the U.S. Census Bureau will cease collection operations on October 5th. This effectively overrules the injunction placed by California Federal Judge Lucy Koh last week, delaying the end of the census to October 31st.
This means time is running out for residents to respond and insure they are counted. New York is currently above average in terms of responses, with 98.4% of households being accounted for according to New York Regional Director Jeff Brehler. The national response rate currently sits at 97.9%.
Brehler hopes to reach 99%, but acknowledges the new deadline may force the Bureau to settle for a lower number.
“In that situation, we will use a statistical method called amputation,” said Brehler. “It is basically looking at data around that house to determine statistically, basically trying to guess, using the data around that home, how many people live there.
This method is obviously less precise, and when it comes to the census, precision is everything considering just how much is at stake.
It may only happen every 10 years, but the U.S. Census is easily one of the most impactful processes in American life. It is not merely a count of the population, the census is the method that government activity is divided all the way down to individual level.
“There’s two groupings we talk about when we talk about the importance of the census,” says Brehler.
“First is representation. We talk about representation at every level of government, from the number of seats New York state will have in the House of Representatives, which ties into electoral college votes, and New York state using 2020 census data for its redistricting purposes,” says Brehler.
The other is the allocation of billions of dollars in federal funding. The Census helps the government decide which schools, hospitals, roads, parks and more get more or less federal funding. If the census does not produce an accurate count, the consequences at the local level can be significant.
“Let’s say you have a school of 100 kids in your neighborhood, and in the 2020 census only 80 of those kids get counted,” says Brehler. “For the next 10 years, that school’s gonna receive 80% of the funding it deserves, and it doesn’t just affect those 20 kids that weren’t counted, it affects all 100. They have the same amount of needs in that school, but now they have less resources to deal with those needs. That’s what getting a complete count on the 2020 census means to your community.”
Fortunately, if you have not yet responded to the census there is still time.
The fastest way is to visit my2020census.gov, and fill out the questionnaire online.
You can also report over the phone by calling 1-844-562-2020, and answer the questionnaire as you would if a census taker were to come to your door.
Finally, if you still have the paper ballot that was mailed to your house, you can still fill it out and mail it back to the address below:
U.S. Census Bureau
National Processing Center
1201 E 10th Street
Jeffersonville, IN 47132
